California Berkeley gymnastics is celebrating.
Senior Tim McNeill won NCAA individual championships on pommel horse and parallel bars Saturday evening at Stanford’s Maples Pavilion. The titles are McNeill’s third on pommel horse and second on parallel bars in four years at California, bringing his career total to five — the most in Cal school history. …
… California head coach Barry Weiner said. “Tim won by 0.650 on pommel and 0.700 on parallel bars, those score differentials are unheard of. He just dominated.” …
Click PLAY or watch both of Tim’s gold routines on YouTube.
Tim McNeill – bio
Incidentally, I spoke with Barry Weiner — an astute gymnastics mind — after the meet. He projects that the USA will win a team medal at the Olympics. With Paul Hamm as an AA anchor, that the States can finish ahead of Korea. And, perhaps, Japan.
Barring disaster, China should win gold as a team. But Barry feels Paul Hamm has a chance to defeat Yang Wei for the AA title, despite having a lower start score.
My own feeling is that the strongest quality the USA can bring to Beijing is consistency. In a competition where all 18 routines count, the USA can “hit” 18 routines. The Chinese competitors are not nearly as well battle tested under pressure.
Gymnastics Coaching.com 