Nadia Comaneci watched Courtney Kupets defend her U.S. all-around gymnastics championship in early June, stunned by the power and strength Kupets exhibited.
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Not even a year before, Kupets’ left Achilles’ tendon had ruptured, sidelining her for about 10 months.
“I told her, `It looked like you never had the injury,'” Comaneci, a gold medalist in 1976, recalled during Tuesday’s women’s team finals at Olympic Indoor Hall. “Most of the time it’s very difficult to come back 100 percent from that injury.”
After months of rehabilitation from an injury that ends many gymnasts’ careers, Kupets apparently won’t end up succumbing to a pulled muscle in her right leg. She was injured again last month.
U.S. coach Kelli Hill, also Kupets’ club coach, said Kupets would compete in Thursday’s all-around finals. Kupets successfully completed her workout Wednesday night.
Carly Patterson, who struggled in the team finals after giving the most dominant overall performance in the preliminaries, will join Kupets in all-around.
The U.S. won silver, its best Olympic finish abroad, behind Romania in the final. The team was in first place after two rotations but crumbled after Kupets scratched from the balance beam.
About 20 minutes before the team competed on beam, Kupets told Hill and USA Gymnastics women’s team coordinator Martha Karolyi that her injury had flared up. It has bothered her most on the beam, she said later.
Mohini Bhardwaj replaced her with a strong but lower-scoring routine than Kupets probably would have had.
Kupets believed she could still hit her floor exercise routine, but she also said she wanted to save herself for the individual finals, leaving room for speculation that the team’s finish was secondary to her personal goals.
“I told her it was her decision,” Hill said. “But I wanted her to be smart.”
Hill also said pulling Kupets from beam was in the best interest of the team.
“We made a team decision,” Hill said. “I don’t know what her personal decisions are.”
Kupets competed on floor, but mistakes marred the routine. They were about as bad as the blunder Patterson committed on uneven bars, when she nearly stopped her routine midway through and scraped her legs against the low bar. Kupets did not blame the injury for her errors.
Though they led the U.S. to a silver medal, both need solid all-around performances for a sense of redemption.
Assuming Kupets can finish.