Gymnastics switches focus for meet against Arizona

This weekend against Arizona, UCLA gymnastics will use the same routines and lineup that it did in last weekend’s meet against Stanford.

Because of this, there is a strong chance its competition in Tuscon will look very similar to the one that happened a week ago in Pauley Pavilion, but that doesn’t mean something hasn’t changed for the Bruins.

While so much of the actual competition is set to remain constant, the mindset of the competitors will be entirely different this week as they take the floor against the Wildcats.

Instead of focusing on the team’s old goal, getting a combined score of 197, coach Valorie Kondos Field has given her team a new goal: to “hit” all six of the routines in each of the four events. This means that every Bruin’s routine is done confidently and mostly mistake-free.

“Now we’ve put significance on everyone’s routine. We’re making everyone accountable,” said sophomore Danusia Francis.

Competing with the team score in mind led to two main issues. First, athletes would try too hard not to make a mistake and hurt their team – losing focus in the process and ultimately making a mistake – which shouldn’t happen if each athlete is simply trying to hit the best routine they can regardless of what it means for the team, Kondos Field said.

And while the the second reason why the Bruins have moved away from competing with a specific team score has to do with maintaining focus, it requires an understanding of the nuances of NCAA gymnastics competition. In every meet, six athletes compete in each event but only the scores from five routines contribute toward the team’s combined total.

So the old problem with competing for a team score was that if an athlete fell or made a large-deduction mistake in the middle of their routine, they often lost focus and finished it out poorly, Kondos Field said. But under the new goal, which she calls “going 24 for 24,” even the routines that don’t ultimately count toward the team’s combined score are important.

Francis said this new mindset has resulted in changes in the way the team practices.

Now after an athlete makes a mistake on balance beam, for example, instead of immediately jumping off the bar and ending the practice routine, they redo the skill or regroup as if they were in the middle of a meet and finish the routine out.

And even though that focus to finish a routine well even if it is guaranteed a subpar score is freshly trained, redshirt junior Samantha Peszek said the Bruins’ new goal is especially valuable because it takes the judges out of the equation.

“It’s hard for people to think of a score goal because it’s subjective; it’s not a definite thing. I could do a 10 routine, only get a 9.95 and I would have no control of those scores,” Peszek said. “But hitting one beam routine is all in our control, which means so is hitting 24 for 24.”