Team USA looks to bring a strong delegation to this year’s World Artistic Gymnastic Championships.
Following competition at the World Team Selection Event, USA Gymnastics has announced their team for this year’s World Artistic Gymnastics Championships.The team includes Simone Biles, Shilese Jones, Skye Blakely, Leanne Wong, and Joscelyn Roberson. Kayla DiCello was named the traveling alternate. The squad is largely built with gymnastics veterans with only one rookie to the world stage. Notable absences, after rough performances at the selection event, are Olympic Champion Jade Carey, and Olympic silver medalist Jordan Chiles. Also missing from the team is Olympic all-around champion Sunisa Lee. Lee opted out of the selection event due to a medical issue with her kidneys.
Simone Biles is the only US woman in history to be selected to compete at six World Artistic Gymnastics Championships. This year’s worlds will take place in Antwerp, Belgium, which will be a full circle moment for Biles, who made her world championships debut in 2013 at Antwerp, Belgium. She will look to make more history on the competition floor. She currently has 25 World Championship medals, the most among men or women. Biles intends to add to that collection; she is the favorite to take home medals in the team, all-around, vault, balance beam, and floor finals. Biles looks to become the first woman to ever land the Yurchenko double pike vault in an international competition. Should she complete this, the vault will be named The Biles.
Besides Biles, Team USA will bring other veterans to the competition floor. After winning three world medals at last year’s World Championships, Shilese Jones will look to continue her rise. She enters the competition as a medal contender in both the all-around and uneven bars finals.
Skye Blakely was also a member of last year’s gold medal winning team.
During the balance beam final last year, Blakely seemed primed to win gold. However, she fell on the penultimate skill in her routine and finished in fifth place. This year, Blakely will eye redemption on beam, where she has one the highest potential scores on the event.
Three time world medalist Leanne Wong brings poise and consistency to the team. Wong is the only member to have made three consecutive World Championship teams, and while she may not be a favorite for individual medals, her execution across all four events will be key to helping the team win gold.
In a team filled with veterans, the only World Championship rookie, Joscelyn Roberson, is sure to make a memorable debut. Roberson, a star on both vault and floor exercises, will look to shine on these apparatuses. She has the second highest level of difficulty amongst World Championship competitors on both events and will hope to medal in each final.
Team USA will look to win their seventh consecutive World Championships team title. They will begin their campaign on Sunday, Oct. 1 at 10:45 am CT.