Can Svetlana Khorkina do it? (2004 Olympic Gymnastics)

Kam's "Favorite Olympic Moment" thread got me thinking about my favorite gymnast: Svetlana Khorkina of Russia. Still not sure why I got to like her so much, but she has a level of style and refinement that I've seldom seen before. Maybe it's her height, maybe it's the fact that she won every uneven bars gold medal in her career until just a few years ago, maybe it's the fact that she has a move named after her on every apparatus. But for whatever reason, I just love Khorkina.

She won the all-around title at the Worlds last year at age TWENTY-FOUR. I was shocked when that happened, and that got me thinking: what are the odds that she finally wins that elusive Olympic all-around? I think she's been on top of the women's gymnastics world for the past 6 years at least, but she just seems to have the worst luck at the Olympics, what with that mal-adjusted vaulting apparatus in 2000 and such. I mean, I think she can win it, but everything I know about the sport keeps screaming "female gymnasts peak at age 16/17! Khorkina would be the first 20-or-older to win it since 1968! Quit your crazy thoughts!"

Don't wanna get my hopes up, but by the time the games come they'll probably be real high anyway. I'll probably be crushed if she doesn't do it, though not as much as when she finally lost on the uneven bars two years ago in international competition. Not only lost, but fell off twice. I mean, she may be the best ever on uneven bars. Her falling off is about the equivalent of Aleksandr Karelin losing to a high-schooler 5 points to none. I hope her determination pulls her through... she wants that all-around gold BAD.


Man, between the Khorkina story and American Paul Hamm being a favorite to do the unthinkable (beat out Aleksei Nemov), gymnastics is gonna be one of the hot events for this Olympics.

 

Errr... that's kinda random, but okay:

Au contraire, Dawes was awesome, but she was no Khorkina, much as I loved her.

 

Yeah, I think she's like 5'6"... which is certainly one of the more impressive things about her; that she can win an all-around against 4-foot-somethings who have a huge edge balance-wise on the beam. The other bizarre thing is that she may be the best ever on uneven bars, even despite the fact that she's so tall she has to bend her knees significantly for every swing so she doesn't hit the low bar. Talk about overcoming handicaps/adversity...