Hagerty, Hamm, Spring & Tan Round Out Team

The Olympic year is here! Subscribe or Renew now so that you don’t miss a single issue of Inside Gymnastics! Plus, subscribe for 3 years and receive a FREE poster of Nastia Liukin!

For the lucky four, it was well worth the wait. The remaining members of the men’s Olympic team were supposed to be announced at a 1:30 p.m. athletes’ meeting, but when the men showed up, they were told by the Selection Committee to come back in two hours—an excruciating delay when you’re waiting for the biggest news of your life.

A few of the 13 gymnasts still in contention went to grab a tense bite, though they were probably too nervous to eat. Several huddled with their families for emotional support. Some even tried to sleep. But most just paced, worried and wondered.

“That was the worst part,” alternate David Durante said. “You’ve got no control and, come on, you just want the news already.”

Hagerty agreed. “It was harsh,” he said. “The waiting was pretty hard. I was just pacing in my room those [last two] hours.”

The wait ended at 3:30 when, in a ten-minute meeting, Hagerty, Morgan Hamm, Justin Spring and Kevin Tan found out they would join Paul Hamm and Jonathan Horton in Beijing this summer.

“I am so glad they just named the team,” Spring said with a mile-wide grin, “easy to say since I’m on it, I know. I couldn’t take another [week-long] wait.”

The Selection Committee had the option of just settling on a training team and not specifying alternates and competitors until July 1, but elected to finalize the squad instead.

“It was 90 to 95 percent based on scores and final results,” National Team Coordinator Ron Brant said of the somewhat surprising picks. “From there, we looked at consistency.”

Brant explained that the Selection Committee—Brant, Men’s Program Senior Director Dennis McIntyre, Athlete Representative Jay Thornton, Coaches’ Representative Bill Foster and MPC member Stacy Maloney—used the computer modeling as a starting point, assembling the best teams under the 6-5-4 (team prelims) and 6-3-3 (team finals) formats. They used those scenarios as a jumping-off point for the final selection, but were sure not take an Olympic team finals berth for granted.

“Most of the teams [we looked at] were separated by three tenths,” Brant explained. “Our priority was 6-3-3, so we had to look at that first … [but] we’re in subdivision one [for qualifying]. We’ve got to hold up for the whole day against everybody. And, in subjective judging, we’ve got to have a good, strong start.”

Assigned as alternates—three were named, but only two will travel to Beijing, with those to be determined following the July 13-22 training camp—are Sasha Artemev, Raj Bhavsar and Durante.

Both Bhavsar and Durante had the meet of their lives in yesterday’s finals—in particular, Bhavsar, who came within a tenth of locking into an automatic spot.

Despite that near miss, Bhavsar says not making the team was far less painful this time around. (He was also an alternate in 2004.)

“This was way easier,” said a subdued, but not devastated, Bhavsar. “way easier. I’m in a better place now. I am OK, to tell you the truth.”

“Alternate is a very tough role,” Durante acknowledged. “It’s not something I would have wanted, but it’s a part of sport, a part of life.

“It is better than nothing,” he added with a laugh. “My primary role will be to support this team and do everything I can to push and make these guys better.”

Perhaps the most shocking exclusion from the squad was Sasha Artemev. Despite his disastrous pommel horse performance—he missed three out of four routines at USAs and Trials—many expected Artemev to be named to the team simply because, even at his worst, he is the best on the USA’s weakest event.

“The issue came down to, ‘Are we gonna base our entire team decision on one event?’ Which is pommels,” Brant explained. “And we realized we were going to potentially give up a lot to get one [strong event].”

“It’s a disappointment,” Artemev said of not being selected. “I was surprised, I guess, but I can’t criticize. I certainly could have performed better and had a better shot.”

Last night, Kevin Tan was saying the same thing. After missing all but rings, Tan felt he may have put his spot in jeopardy and said he was sweating when the names were announced, in alphabetical order—meaning his was dead last. “I was counting down the numbers,” he admitted. “OK, that’s one, two, three, only one left and, finally, they said my name.

“It’s just unreal,” Tan said of being an Olympian. “It hasn’t really hit me yet that I can call myself that yet. Wow. This is the Olympic Games. This is the big one.”

That disconnect was a theme for all the newly minted Olympians. Hagerty, the only ’08 team member who hasn’t previously been on a world squad, was literally speechless, saying he woke up this morning with laryngitis. “Honestly, it still hasn’t sunk in yet, to tell you the truth,” he said in a whisper.

Nothing could keep the loquacious Spring quiet, now that his Olympic dreams have come true. “I love this. All of this,” he said of the media madhouse. “How long do you get to be famous? As a gymnast, it’s not even 15 minutes. I’m loving it. Every minute of it, and I’m gonna keep on loving it. I’m going to Beijing, baby!”

For Hamm, making his third Olympic team proved the most stressful. A tweaked ankle kept him from being at his best in yesterday’s finals, and he had to hope his past performance—and wealth of experience—was enough to get him the benefit of the doubt from the Selection Committee.

“I was a little bit nervous,” Hamm admitted. “I wasn’t sure, but I felt good about my pommel horse, which was one of the main events I knew they were looking for.”

Hamm also shrugged off concerns about his ankle. “It will be fine, I’m not worried about that,” he said. “They know I can do floor.”

As for heading toward a third Games with his twin brother, Paul, who was named to the team last night, Hamm was more effusive. “That’s why I do this,” he said of his comeback in the sport. “I mean three Olympics, as twins; I don’t think anyone else has ever done that.”

And that’s what the Hamms—and the entire 2008 Olympic team—would like to do this August: make a little bit of history.

“Our goal is to go into Beijing and win a gold medal,” USA Gymnastics President Steve Penny said, “and this team has been constructed to do that.”

The Olympic year is here! Subscribe or Renew now so that you don’t miss a single issue of Inside Gymnastics! Plus, subscribe for 3 years and receive a FREE poster of Nastia Liukin!