Sunisa Lee shares training updates as Paris preparation begins
Plus, Jennifer Gadirova undergoes ankle surgery and a look back at Japan's Takenaka Miho from Sydney 2000
Artistic Gymnastics
Reigning Olympic all-around champion Sunisa Lee appears to be gaining steam in her quest for a return trip to the Olympic Games.
The Tokyo artistic gymnastics champion shared two posts of her training this week on Instagram. The first came in a carousel post captioned, “life lately,” and featured the 20-year-old performing a back layout stepout mount into two back handsprings on the balance beam.
Lee’s second update was a story video post showing her training a giant one-and-a-half pirouette, an element the American hasn’t competed since the 2019 season.
The Minnesota-native has never been shy sharing updates with her legions of fans, but after a difficult 2023 season that saw her working to overcome a kidney-related health issue that ended her collegiate season early, the recent posts may show progress.
“I have been in and out of the gym just because there’s just so many doctor’s appointments, and I’m taking a lot of medication, so it kind of varies every day,” Lee told Olympics.com in an exclusive interview last summer. “I could wake up very swollen some days and not be able to put my fingers inside my grips. It’s really difficult to kind of work through, but on the days that I can do stuff and I am feeling good, I try and take advantage of that and just get everything done.
Though Lee competed at the U.S. Classic and U.S. Championships in August, she withdrew from the U.S. World selection competition a month later.
At a media event in November, Lee told USA Today she had made progress managing her health issues.
“We’re still working on trying to figure out how to balance all of it because I do have good days and bad days,’’ she said. “But with the good days I just take advantage of what I’m able to do, and on the bad days I just do basics and try and stay as safe as possible.’’
Lee has yet to declare her intended competitions for 2024, but the U.S. elite gymnastics season begins in late February with the Winter Cup in Louisville, Kentucky.
Jennifer Gadirova joins sister Jessica with injury rehab
Tokyo 2020 Olympic team bronze medallist Jennifer Gadirova shared on Instagram this week that she had undergone surgery on her ankle.
"Over the past few months, I have been experiencing some discomfort in my ankle. Due to this, our team and the doctor came to the conclusion of having an arthroscopy to wash out the ankle 🤍," Gadirova said in the post. "The rehab and recovery journey starts now! 💪🏼"
The announcement comes just weeks after twin sister Jessica, the 2022 World floor exercise champion, underwent surgery to repair a torn ACL suffered at the 2023 Worlds in Antwerp, Belgium.
Jessica Gadirova responded to her sister's post, saying "We got this Jen! #rehabbuddies"
From the vault…
This week, we take a look back at a mixed group of athletes from qualifying at the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney, Australia, featuring Japan’s Takenaka Miho and legendary gymnast Oksana Chusovitina of Uzebekistan.