USA’s Carey floors ’em for gold
TOKYO — Jade Carey traveled the world for a spot in the Olympics. Germany. Qatar. Azerbaijan. Australia.
A lot of long flights. A little bit of jet lag. One unrelenting vision of what could be possible.
She wasn’t going to let a little thing like a sticky patch of carpet get in her way.
The 21-year-old American gymnast soared to gold in the women’s floor exercise Monday night, her powerful and precise routine capping a roller-coaster 24 hours in which she narrowly avoided serious injury during the vault finals when her right foot caught just as she was preparing her entry.
Carey’s score of 14.366 gave the U.S. women’s team its fifth medal of the Games and assured that each of the six athletes who came to Tokyo — Carey, Simone Biles, Sunisa Lee, Jordan Chiles, Grace McCallum and MyKayla Skinner — will be checking some serious bling in customs when they return home.
Considered one of the favorites after coming in second during vault qualifying, Carey was thundering down the blue runway Sunday when she tripped. Her planned Cheng vault instead became a simple back tuck, her medal chances evaporating in the process.
Stunned, she recovered in time to complete her second vault but finished well off the podium before quietly retreating to the waiting arms of her father Brian, her lifelong coach, and the comfort of her teammates.
Knowing his daughter had less than a day to regroup in time for the floor finals, Brian Carey turned off the “coach” switch and flipped on the “dad” one.
“I told her, ‘You know, right now, you feel like yesterday was the worst day in your life, but today can be your best day. So just don’t give up. Keep going,’” Carey said. “And she killed it.”
Carey doesn’t leap off the floor as much as she explodes. Her tumbling is as dynamic as anyone in the world not named Biles, and she’s working on a triple-twisting double-layout element that — if she ever completes it in international competition — will be given the single-highest difficulty value of anything currently being done in the sport.
While it’s not quite ready to be unveiled when it counts, Carey also didn’t need it. A day after her meandering road to the Ariake Gymnastics Centre nearly ended in disaster, she responded with what she called the best routine of her career.
Carey could hear teammates roaring from the stands during her routine, Biles perhaps the loudest of them all.
“They were honestly the best teammates ever, especially (Sunday) night,” Carey said.