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You Be the Selection Committee: Who Should Represent USA at Worlds in Antwerp?

With recent announcements of the Chinese and Russian worlds team, that leaves gym fans in the USA wondering who will go on to Antwerp to represent the USA?

I'm asking you, gym-nerds everywhere, to chose your picks for the athletes you would make your worlds team with.



Since this is the year after the Olympics, the Worlds will be an individual only event, meaning there will be an individual all-around competition and event finals only. Each country is allowed to bring four gymnasts. Two can qualify for the all-around and only two per country on event finals.

Here is the list of girls invited to the selection camp. Just a note, Madison Kocian and Lexie Priessman were both invited to the camp but withdrew due to their injuries.

Simone Biles 
McKayla Maroney 
Elizabeth Price 
Maggie Nichols 
Abigail Milliet 
Mykayla Skinner 
Kyla Ross 
Maddie Desch 
Brenna Dowell 
Peyton Ernst 
Kennedy Baker 


Let's pretend you're Marta Karolyi, so put on a track suit, and start talking with a Romanian accent and start picking, who would you pick and why?

At this point, pending an act of God, it's safe to say that Simone, McKayla and Kyla will most likely be put on the team. Simone and Kyla would compete in the all-around and McKayla would do vault (duh) and most likely floor. Kyla would more than likely qualify for the bars final and beam. Simone would be a shoo-in for vault and floor and maybe beam.

For the fourth spot, the US has a weak spot on the uneven bars, the bars are the pommel horse for the women, their Achilles heel per say. Brenna Dowell could easily fill the spot on bars, provided she ups her execution score. There's also Elizabeth Price, who looked fantastic last year, but has struggled this year due to injury.

MyKayla Skinner throws a lot of cool tricks, including her double double layout on floor but has execution issues sometimes and often struggles on bars and beam. Her best bet for making the team would be floor or vault.

Then there's the Texas Dreams girls, Peyton and Kennedy. Kennedy is consistent, but never really breaks out of the middle of the pack. She is an all-arounder and is consistent and could be counted on for any event, although she might need to add upgrades to her beam and bars to be considered. Peyton could be considered for her beam, her bars didn't have a huge start value, especially not high enough to compete with someone like Aliya Mustafina during a bar final. Although she could be selected for the fourth spot and be put as a third all-around contender and she could gain some international experience. The same argument can be made for Kennedy Baker.

So now, you make your picks. Make your arguments as to which gymnast you would choose and why.  You can back up your arguments with historical data, gut feelings etc. Comment  down below with your picks or use the contact me form at the end of the post.

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