Continuing my series of our Olympic Contenders, here is Alicia Sacramone.

I will admit it. Alicia is my favorite gymnast. She wasn’t always. I was enamored like everyone else with Shawn and Nastia in 2008. But since her comeback, I have come to respect and enjoy her so much. She is such a mature, inspiring, fun person. And her gymnastics is so fun to watch! Her vault is sky high. Her beam is so dynamic. And her new floor routine is one of my all time favorites! It has passion, beauty, great expression of the music and of course, power!

Alicia had such an incredible 2011 year. She was in the best shape of her life. I have never seen her look as good as she did in podium training for worlds. And then…. she tore her achilles tendon two days before prelims. My heart broke! Now she is on the long road of trying to rehab what used to be a career ending injury.

I think Alicia has to upgrade on vault if she is to make the team. Even though Alicia is a world class vaulter, all of our alll-arounders can currently match or come very close to her score. Though her beam is steady and sharp, we have a handful of gymnasts that can fill the bill on beam. It was looking a little ify on if she was going to get her floor down and I wonder if it is worth it for her to train that with her achilles. Alicia is an incredible team leader and brings so much personality to USA gymnastics. But with only five on a team, I just can’t envision her making the team unless she brings in the highest valued USA vault. She was going to debut her handspring laid-out double twist at the 2011 Worlds. So I am really hoping that she can not only come back to her former strength in the short time she has, but to be able to compete that vault as well!