With a talented team of returners and promising newcomers, the UCLA gymnastics team hopes to redeem itself after last year’s disappointing season closer.
The 2008 season was marked by injuries to top performers such as Kristina Comforte, now a senior, and junior Anna Li and ultimately culminated in a disappointing seventh-place finish at the NCAA Championships in Athens, Ga.
However, the girls aren’t letting the memory of last year’s problems affect how they perform this season.
“Things didn’t really go our way at the NCAA Championships,” junior gymnast Anna Li said. “As a team, we did the best we could, but we had a lot of injuries. But the girls that were injured last year had surgery over the summer, or their injuries healed.”
Last year’s injuries are a thing of the past as the girls open the 2009 season ranked No. 4 in preseason coaches polls.
“Preseason went really well,” Li said. “As a team, we all got together and practiced before school started. We lost three seniors, but we gained a huge team of freshmen.”
In fact, the freshmen account for eight of the 18 members for the 2009 gymnastics team, including 2008 Olympian Elyse Hopfner-Hibbs. The addition of so many freshmen may aid in lifting some of the burden off of the injury-prone team.
“We’ve never had a big enough team to alternate gymnasts for different meets,” senior gymnast Melissa Chan said.
“But we have a large team this year, so we might be able to do that. It would help with keeping too many players from getting injured.”
Preventing injuries will be important for the team’s success this year.
“Staying healthy is a main priority, especially towards the end of the season,” Chan said.
In addition to the newly-added freshmen, and their strategy for remaining healthy, the gymnastics team follows a strenuous practice schedule.
“We practice for four hours every day, even during finals,” Li said. “While everyone leaves right after finals, we stay behind for a few days, go home for Christmas, then come back before everyone else.”
After a long summer spent rehabilitating injuries and initiating freshmen, the UCLA gymnastics team is prepared for its upcoming season.
“We’re really, really excited this year,” redshirt sophomore Brittani McCullough said. “We really want people to come out and cheer us on, because the more people are there, the more motivated we are.”
The team’s first meet will be at Utah on January 9.