Word: liukin
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...Rest assured, Shawn. After winning the gold in the balance beam finals on the last day of gymnastics competition Tuesday, you can now call yourself the beam queen. Edging out teammate - and newly crowned Olympic all-around champion - Nastia Liukin by 0.2 points, Johnson now has her first ever gold at a Games. "To finish off on the very last routine of my Olympic experience with a gold medal around my neck is the perfect ending to the story...
...fairy tale, however, has had its ups and downs in Beijing. The most consistent performer on the mats all week, Johnson had only three silver medals to show for all her efforts. After her second place finish to Liukin, Johnson's emotions came flooding out, and as positive as her words were about the experience, her voice and face told a different story. "It's been a really long road," she said after the all-around competition on August 15. "To finally be here at the end, all the emotions are coming to us and we don't know...
...competition highlighted the two girls' contrasting gymnastics styles. Liukin, a willowy 5'3", resembles the gymnasts of the Nadia Comaneci era, when girls in the sport were long and lean and looked more like dancers than tight end defenders. Since the 1980s, however, thanks in part to the growing number of injuries and the more challenging skills the gymnasts are trying on the mats, the sturdier bodies, like Johnson's, at 4'9", have been claiming more titles - think Mary Lou Retton, Kerri Strug, Shannon Miller, and 2004 Olympic all-around champion Patterson. These are powerful athletes...
...athletic ones. The legendary Comaneci, watching from the stands at the National Indoor Stadium, said "In order to get very high start values, they don't do any artistic moves, especially on the floor exercise. It's almost like you should do only six tumbling passes and finish." Liukin, however, is a gymnast with a balletic aesthetic, and one who can bring back the 'artistic' to artistic gymnastics, its official Olympic name. Her precise arm movements, impossibly pointed feet and gracefully arching back, are just what the judges love to see. But given that this is the first Olympics under...
...Liukin can rest assured that her gold medal was fully deserved, after a flawless competition and against an equally aggressive rival. But as meaningful as the medal is for Liukin, it might be an even sweeter victory for her father. Twenty years ago, in another heated battle between teammates, Valeri Liukin, competing for Russia, lost the 1988 men's all-around Olympic title in Seoul to Vladimir Artyomov. "She fixed my mistake," said her father. "I was second, half a tenth behind Vladimir, and she fixed that. I am very proud," he said, too emotional to continue. Liukin senior might...