Gym Dog Update

Jay Clark has cracked the whip. No one needs to tell you that things are a little more intense in Athens this preseason, it is evident from the workout videos. First off, the girls all appear to be in strong physical condition and McComb is noticeably thinner than she was last season. When McComb is in shape, she is capable of refining her routines and hitting big. Last year, making her routines was her real concern (whether or not she admitted it.)

Gina Nuccio looks more like than Gina Nuccio that was recruited than the Calamity Gina of last season whose routines got sloppier by the day. This is the best she's looked at Georgia. Gina's shoulder angle on her series is beyond ridiculous. It is amazing that she manages to ever stay on the beam.

Kat Ding looks as strong as ever. She even looks to be getting it together on beam. Her gainer front flip is higher.

Shayla Worley is currently healthy for these five seconds. She may herniate another disc by the time you're done reading this post. Jay needs to get her handstands up to Nastia levels so she can enter the 9.900 range on bars.

Noel Couch is looking very much like a fugly mess who will hit every routine this season. The red headed step children always manage to hit. (I'm looking at you Rebecca Bross and Rachael Flatt.)

Hilary Mauro is looking as driven as ever. She is adding all sorts of passes that she's always wound up watering down in the past. It has yet to be seen whether Jay will make her the beam leadoff again and restore sanity in the beam lineup.

The girl with the long ponytail, craptacularly low jaegar and double layout dismount on bars is Cat Hires. She looks to have recovered from injury rather quickly. We can only hope that she will straddle her release skills and get some freakin amplitude. If she can manage that, she could score well for the team. Cat is one of those gymnasts who they are hoping will improve a great deal (like McComb and Ding.)

Kaylan Earls looks solid on beam, but we can only imagine that she is hindorffing and tumbling well.

Christa Tanella is looking sluggish on beam, but she did manage to land a tumbling pass. 

Sadly, we were not treated to any of their preseason vaults. There is nothing I enjoy more than watching Mauro do whatever it is that she is actually doing on vault. Her 1.5 twisting yurchenko has a tendency to look like a Munchkin swept up in a tornado in the Land of Oz.

It looks like the team is keeping grumpy Jay away by working hard. They lack the depth and star power of other teams, but they look capable of being a scrappy team if they can remain healthy.