The Alabama Football Team's successful trip to Auburn on Saturday must have sparked the Alabama Gymnastics Team because they were certainly vaulting, leaping, pirouetting, and tumbling with renewed energy on this date. Former Tide gymnasts, Merritt Booth and Gwen Spidle, were present to lend extra encouragement while Tide fans, Salto, Salsa, and Saltine were in attendance also and were eager to see some of the new moves Bama is throwing in the gym these days. Mega highlights include:

Vault

Bama's 10.0 valued vaults appear to be increasing in number by each week. Two weeks ago the Pooh Bear's assistants were predicting possibly two to three 10.0 vaults to start off the season but there has been dramatic improvement already by a number of gymnasts, leading us to speculate on the feasibility now of seeing 3 to 4 10.0 vaults being consistently thrown by January. For example, we entered the gym just in time to see sophomore Alexa Martinez throw the highest and strongest handspring front pike ½ twist vault that we have ever seen from her. Alexa appears to be running the vault lane much faster and more powerfully, resulting in greater height and distance on her vaults. Sophomore Natalie Barrington continues to amaze us with her drive and determination on vault. She threw a beautiful handspring front pike on several occasions and was working on a front pike ½ twist vault towards the end. Freshman Sara Scarborough is showing arguably the most consistent form, extension and landing on her front pike. She appears to be making great strides towards mastering this vault and preparing for upgrading it with a ½ twist as well. Freshman Kristin Sterner was throwing a handspring front layout ½ very confidently and Tide fans can already pencil her into the vaulting lineup for 2000. Solid vaulting runs were also seen by junior Dara Stewart (front pike only on this date), sophomore Whitney Morgan (front pike), junior Robin Hawkins, sophomore Krista Gole, junior Katie Hornecker (Tsukaharas), and the ever-powerful sophomore, Andree Pickens (Yurchenko).

Uneven Bars

Sophomore Raegan Tomasek was looking much stronger on the bars today as she threw her new toe on/toe off on the high bar and her pike Jaeger with more consistency and confidence. The return of Natalie's inverted giants (two in a row, second in pike position) in the eagle grip are truly awesome to see. She added her reverse Hecht (Tkatchev) and a front pike dismount with relative ease. Kristin was throwing both a pike Jaeger and a Tkatchev release and dismounted with a double tuck out of a reverse giant. Alexa continued to struggle with her Tkatchev release but has added a double layout dismount that is already looking great. Lexa had her release move (Tkatchev) and dismount (front layout with a ½ twist) down solid and was primarily working on a smoother transition from the high bar to the low bar, which is not nearly as easy as we fans might think. Andree completed her full routine (four major releases) and her new dismount (double layout) like another walk in the park. Dara decided to forego practicing her full twisting Tkatchev on this date but did complete her routine with beautiful extension and toe point. Her landing out of her new dismount (double layout with a ½ twist) was not as solid as we have seen in previous practices but this appeared to be mainly due to some fatigue. Krista is showing solid improvement in her rotation, leg extension and toe point and also has a dismount of double tuck out of a reverse giant. Fans can expect to see a lot of competition for two to three positions in the bars line up this year. Consistency in completing release moves may well be the deciding factor.

Balance Beam

The most exciting thing about watching beam practice on this date was seeing Katie Hornecker go through her complete routine! Katie has a flight series of flip flop, flip flop, layout, a Miller that she then shifts into a plange down onto the beam, a ¾ wolf jump, and a double tuck dismount. Now we know how she won the "Ghosts versus Goblins" all around competition a few weeks ago! Whitney electrified us all with an incredibly high and tight front pike dismount that she nailed perfectly. Alexa has added a punch front back into her routine and was throwing it consistently. Kristin showed off her flight series of flip flop layout layout and never missed her Popa (360 degree jump). Robin, Dara, Lissy and Andree were all looking very confident on the beam. Robin appears to be poised once again to reenter the beam line up and she was working on a new dismount off the side of the beam that looked like a round off into a double twist.

Floor Exercise

Coach Patterson was busy refining dance moves and leaps on floor with Raegan and Kristin while other gymnasts were executing tumbling runs to build stamina and endurance for competition season. Raegan, Robin and Katie have brand new music that the fans will really dig but we want to keep it a secret for "Meet the Team" in January in order to enjoy the full effect. If you cannot wait that long, come to practice for a sneak preview!