Mckayla Maroney Takes Silver

Mckayla Maroney Takes Silver - In wasn’t the expected gold, but the American women picked up another medal Sunday in gymnastics at the London Olympics. Favored McKayla Maroney, just five days after helping the USA to team gold, won the silver medal in the individual vault at North Greenwich Arena. She had a fall on the second of her two attempts, otherwise would have easily won gold because of the degree of difficulty in her vault. Scores are averaged and Maroney scored 15.866 on her first attempt but 14.3 on her second. Her total was 15.083.


Sandra Raluca Izbasa of Romania won the gold at 15.191. Maria Paseka won of Russia won the bronze at 15.050.

The only other American competing on Sunday was Jake Dalton in the men’s floor exercise. He took fifth with a score of 15.333. Kai Zou of China win the gold with 15.937 while gymnastics legend Kohei Uchimura of Japan took silver and Denis Ablyazin of Russia took bronze.

But Sunday’s individual session, like most gymnastics competitions, was about the women, specifically the American woman. Maroney came in the with highest qualifying score and as the reigning world champion.

To be in this situation is something she has wanted for a long time.

In Maroney’s elementary school yearbook picture, she looks like any other fifth grader — wide smile, hair pulled back in a clip, striped shirt. Underneath her school picture, she wrote about her favorite memory of her time at Moulton Elementary in Laguna Niguel, Calif.: the Boo Blast, a Halloween carnival. Then she wrote, “My goal for the future is to be in the Olympics.”

Recently Maroney tweeted that picture with the message “Dream big!!!” This past week, those big dreams came true in bigger-than-life fashion.

Maroney has the finest Amanar in the world. The move is one of the toughest there is in the sport: a roundoff onto the takeoff board, followed by a back handspring onto the vault and then 2.5 twists in the air before landing.