U.S. Women at the 2015 World Gymnastics Championships!
If you followed the recent competitions of the 2015 World Gymnastics Championships, you know one thing for certain – Team U.S.A. ROCKED ‘EM winning their third consecutive World's first place title! Go USA!
While we’re excited for our home team, we recognize that these wins were not easy feats. The World Gymnastics Championships, which lasted 10 days, drew more than 500 gymnasts from dozens of countries in pursuit for world titles and qualification to the Rio 2016 Olympic Games. Needless to say, the competition is fierce. However, despite the stiff rivalry, Team U.S.A. took home five gold medals, with the Women's Team securing FOUR of those individual titles! They are quite the team, and each of them has worked so hard to get where she is. As former gymnasts ourselves, the Destira team knows that it couldn’t have been done without a great gym and a great coach providing guidance.
So who were our shining stars on the U.S. Women’s Team, and where did they get their starts? Let’s take a look: SIMONE BILES Out of the four gold medals that the U.S. Women’s Team took home, Simone Biles scored THREE of those. That’s right; Simone came in first in her THIRD consecutive Individual All-Around where she made HISTORY as the first female gymnast ever to do so. She also received gold in the Balance Beam and Floor Exercise while nabbing the bronze medal for Vault, as well. Simone Biles is a powerhouse and no stranger to the limelight. At age 18, Simone is now a three-time all-around world champion with back-to-back wins. She can attribute her success based on lots of hard work (obviously!), as well as her long-time training at Houston-based Bannon's Gymnastix - her home gym for 11 of her 12 years as a gymnast. Fun fact: Simone has worked with the same coach, Aimee Boorman, for her entire gymnastics career! GABBY DOUGLAS Gabby Douglas, age 19, is another big name in women's gymnastics, having earned gold medals at the 2012 Summer Olympics for Individual All-Around and Team competitions. She is also the only reigning Olympic all-around gold medalist to return to the World Championship Gymnastics and earn a medal – the silver! – in the all-around competition since the early 80's. At the age of six, Gabby begin her gymnastics training at a local gym in her home state of Virginia, and two years later, she was named state champion. Six years later, when Gabby was 14, she moved to Iowa to join Chow's Gymnastics, working with owner Liang Chow, who's still coaching her today. MAGGIE NICHOLS While this may have been Maggie Nichols’ first World Gymnastics Championship medal, it’s certainly not her first win, since she continues to excel at the national level. And she’s been working at it for a while, having joined Minnesota’s Twin City Twisters at the age of six and working under head coach, Sarah Jantzi, and Rich Stenger. Maggie did Team U.S.A. proud in last week’s Floor competition, earning the bronze medal in that category. She must be extremely proud, considering she had to withdraw from the World Championships training camp last year due to a dislocated kneecap, which happened on floor exercise at the 2014 Pan American Championships!
