San Jose, Calif. &emdash; He didn’t know it at the time, but Alexander Artemev’s chances of defending his all-around title at the U.S. Gymnastics Championships ended with a fall in the first event of Friday night’s finals.
The Morrison gymnast was tied for the lead after Wednesday night’s preliminary rounds, but he stumbled at the end of his floor exercises routine Friday and it cost him the meet. Artemev won the pommel horse gold medal, performed well on the high bar and parallel bars, but ultimately finished fourth.
“I don’t know what happened,” Artemev said of the stumble at the end of his floor routine. “I kind of got lost. Just a foolish mistake. I’m sorry it happened. I got too anxious a little bit.”
Green Mountain High School graduate Guillermo Alvarez finished second behind David Durante, a New Jersey gymnast who has trained the past three years at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs. It was Durante’s first national all-around title and most likely made him the leader of the U.S. men’s team that will compete in the world championships Sept. 2-9 in Stuttgart, Germany.
“It was a flood of emotion like I’ve never had before,” said Durante, who went to college at nearby Stanford University. “I have been waiting for this for a long time. To have it happen here, in the Bay Area, with my friends and family, it is indescribable.”
Durante, 27, was left off the 2004 Olympic team when he felt he deserved to be there. That memory has driven him since.
“Not making that team kept me around another four years,” Durante said. “Sometimes I questioned whether or not it was the right decision, but tonight really made everything worth it.”
Alvarez, 24, won a bronze medal in all-around at last month’s Pan Am Games and performed here with the grit and consistency that has marked his steady rise to prominence within the rebuilding U.S. men’s team.
“I had a pretty consistent week,” Alvarez said. “I had no major errors, no falls, so I was really happy with that.”
Artemev, 21, won the all-around at last year’s U.S. championships and seemed poised to do it again after Wednesday’s rounds, which left him tied with Durante.
“It is disappointing to know I could have had this meet if I’d stayed clean,” Artemev said. “Falling on a dismount is the worst thing with this new scoring system.”
Competing for the first time since he won the all-around at the Athens Olympics, Paul Hamm won floor exercises and was fourth in pommel horse. Hamm and his twin brother, Morgan, have concentrated on their studies at Ohio State the past three years and only competed here in those two events.
“I never really loved competing, it’s a stressful time,” Hamm said. “I like the results of competing, when you’re doing well and the meet’s over, you’re happy.”
Hamm conceded he probably will have to perform better in the Beijing Olympics than he did in Athens if he is to beat Chinese great Yang Wei and defend his Olympic title.
“I have to make up for the difference on rings that I’m being faced with Yang Wei,” Hamm said. “He’s sort of built a wall in his all-around competition with rings and vault. I’m figuring best case scenario I’ll still be down on him by a point in start value, come the Olympic Games, and that’s the best I can do. I might gain a little a little on floor, about the same on pommel horse, rings he’ll crush me, vault he’ll be up by 4/10ths, P-bars he’ll be up by 5/10ths, high bar maybe I’m up I’m up by 8/10ths.
“I have to be cleaner in order to beat him.”
Hamm conceded the pressure on Yang to perform in his home country might help Hamm’s cause.
“He’s got a lot of pressure, and he in the past has had problems in the big competitions,” Hamm said. “China, they have a lot of pressure, more than I could even imagine. I don’t know what happens to them if they lose. Our lives are fine if we lose. I don’t know what happens with them.”
The U.S. championships conclude Saturday night with the finals of the women’s competition.
