Local Sports

By CHRIS PARRY
Staff Writer

Tyler gymnast Alaina Johnson grips the bar and holds herself upright in a perfect handstand. With her coach Martin Parsley looking on, Johnson begins to swing around and around before finally flinging herself skyward and landing into a pool of foam blocks.

She climbs out, readjusts her grips and adds more chalk before doing it again with a big American flag looming just behind her.

Johnson, who competes for Texas East Gymnastics in Tyler, better get used to being surrounded by red, white and blue.

She qualified for the United States national team last week by placing in the top 12 at the Visa Women’s Gymnastics Championships in Boston.

“I wasn’t thinking about (making the national team), I was just thinking about the things I could control,” Johnson said. “It was cool because I knew I would be representing the USA.”

Her next goal is to make the Olympic team and compete later this summer in Beijing.

Johnson will get that chance June 20-22 at the U.S. Olympic Trials in Philadelphia. All national team members and other invitees are slated to compete with the top two finishers earning places on the Olympic team. The other seven women (including the two alternates) will be chosen July 20 after a training camp at the Karolyi ranch.

Ten days ago, Johnson and Parsley arrived in Boston with a modest goal — not to finish last.

Their previous two trips to the gymnastics championships yielded that result. In 2006, 15-year old Johnson was last in Minnesota. Then last year, Johnson was confident heading into the championships in San Jose, Calif., but an injury hampered her throughout.

“We learned not to be injured when you go to a national championship. The day before the meet started, she pulled a muscle in her quadriceps, and we were competing on one leg. In 2006, we were injured all year,” Parsley said about the two previous trips.

After arriving back in Tyler, Johnson told Parsley she’d had enough.

“We came home after it and she was going to quit. She was going to drop back to a lower level and chill out and get ready for college,” Parsley said. “Then we talked for a long time and I told her she can do whatever she wanted to.

“She said, ‘Let’s go for it.’ We started in January going back to the national training center.”

Johnson had only two senior-level meets to get ready for another crack at nationals. She qualified for nationals in Coppell by posting a high-enough score in the all-around. Two weeks later, however, she struggled at a warm-up meet for nationals in Houston, finishing last.

The warm-up meet didn’t feature defending national champion Shawn Johnson and gold-medal hopeful Nastia Liukin, among others.

So Alaina wasn’t exactly brimming with confidence when she took the stage June 5 for the first day of competition. To make matters more difficult, Alaina was drawn in the same group as Liukin and Johnson.

“I didn’t really think about (Liukin and Johnson) a whole lot because when you are out there competing, you have to just think about yourself,” said Alaina about her mindset. “I just figured that just being in the championships was a cool thing. I just tried to do my normal workout and whatever happened, happened.”

What happened surprised Alaina and her coach.

She turned in solid efforts on all four apparatuses to post a first-day score of 56.7. It was good enough for 12th place.

“We were on the bus and Alaina said, ‘So it was a pretty good meet. What place am I in?’ Parsley said. “I told her 12th and she replied, ‘How many do they take on the national team?’

“I replied back with 12 and her smile got kind of big, but then she said she didn’t want to talk about it anymore.”

Johnson was nearly a full point ahead of Ashley Stott with one more day of competition to go.

The one thing the Tyler gymnast wasn’t going to do was psyche herself out.

“I was excited of course, but I didn’t want to think about it a whole lot because I didn’t want to get my mindset on my staying in 12th,” Johnson said.

After one rotation, Johnson dropped to 14th but moved up to 13th on the second rotation with only balanced beam and floor exercise remaining. She slipped off the beam during her performance, but still was in striking distance.

“I told her that we could do it if we (scored solid) in the last event,” Parsley said.

The final event was floor exercise; a favorite of Johnson’s, but not to do last.

“Actually, I don’t like floor being last because I have five (tumbling) passes and it’s really tiring, and it’s probably the most tiring event I do,” Johnson said. “I always do pretty good on floor, so I don’t really get nervous because you can’t really fall off on the floor.”

Johnson’s routine earned her a two-day event score of 14.65, fifth best in the competition.

But would it be enough?

“When it was over, I still didn’t know,” Parsley said. “I finally went to the other end of the arena and said, ‘Someone show me a laptop.’ It showed that she was in 12th place.”

Johnson’s final score of 113 was two-tenths better than Christa Tanella’s 112.8.

On Friday, Johnson received another honor as the 17-year old was presented a plaque from Mayor Barbara Bass proclaiming June 13th as “Alaina Johnson Day” in Tyler.

Next up is the Olympic trials. Parsley said Johnson making the national team was an awesome accomplishment.

To make the Olympic team would fall under the term: miraculous.

“We are realistic and know that we belong to the strongest gymnastics team in the world,” Parsley said. “Of the 12 teams qualified for the Olympics, you know that if you lived in nine of them, you’d be on their Olympic team.

“Alaina doesn’t have any international experience and the top nine have international experience … and four of them are world champions on something.

“We are going to do exactly what we did at the last meet and then go home and watch the Olympics on T.V. like everyone else.”

Johnson echoes Parsley’s sentiments.

“I am just going to try and do my best at the Olympic Trials,” Johnson said. “It would be nice if I went on … but if I don’t that’s fine because I’ve already made my goal.”

SWING AWAY: Tyler gymnast Alaina Johnson practices on the uneven bars while coach Martin Parsley (bottom left) looks on last week at the Texas East Gymnastics Complex in Tyler. Johnson has qualified for the U.S. National Gymnastics Team.
((Staff Photo By Herb Nygren Jr.))