Nastia Liukin and American Cup Wrap Up

Credit: USA Gymnastics
This was an exciting weekend for gymnastics! The Nastia Liukin Cup, American Cup, Russian Championships and English Championships were all this weekend along with some great NCAA matchups. Here are a few videos and links to channels that you should definitely check out!

Nastia Liukin Cup
The Nastia Liukin Cup went fairly well this year. Sydney Johnson-Scharpf was heralded as the next big thing in elite gymnastics. Sydney is a 12 year old Level 10 gymnast at her mother's gym, 1988 US Olympian Brandy Johnson. I like to consider her the floor exercise love child of Mattie Larson and Sabrina Vega - excellent tumbling and leaps but also great at performing during every moment of her routine. Watch her FX that qualified her to the Nastia Liukin Cup here.

From the senior gymnasts, we saw lots of great gymnastics that we'll get to see in NCAA next year. Alex McMurtry took 1st in the all-around and earned the highest scores on VT, BB, and FX. She'll be headed to Florida next year. Second place finisher, Aja Sims wll be headed to Alabama and Samantha Partyka, who finished in 3rd, will head to Utah. Surprise of the meet for me was Kari Lee who was in the lead for sometime but then fell to 4th place when she finished on uneven bars, the event with the tightest scoring. She'll be headed to Arizona. Check out more of the future NCAA gymnasts here. Watch Alex's FX here or below:




American Cup
American Cup was a great competition and featured the senior debut of Americans Katelyn Ohashi and Simone Biles - this was also Biles' first international meet. Ohashi won with some great all around performances and a new floor routine here. Biles came in 2nd after a fall on beam and some difficulties on floor exercise. Victoria Moors of Canada rounded out the medals but had the highest score on floor exercise. The gymternet seemed very moved by Victoria Moors' stellar performances and many started hailing her "Queen Victoria." Watch her FX below:


Gabby Jupp of Great Britain became the sweetheart of gymnastics. Some felt that she was underscored on a few events but overall, had a great senior debut. If Tunney's success last year after the American Cup is any indication, we can expect to see more of Jupp on the World stage. On uneven bars, my only qualm is the "Komova 1/2 turn" but otherwise great routine. She placed 2nd on balance beam with a 6.3 D score (8.133 E, 13.433). Watch here or below:


Check here for more routines and here for a replay.