Just wanted to wish the US guys that are competing at the World Cup meet in Moscow “good luck.”  The guys that are competing are Guillermo Alvarez, Raj Bhavsar, Chris Brooks, and my Stanford teammate, David Sender.  Dave will be competing on rings and vault, which should be exciting considering he is a beast on those two events.  He’s also upped his start value on rings since the beginning of the year.  For the rest of the national team members, we are meeting up later this week at the Olympic Training Center for a training camp.

For those of you that aren’t familiar with World Cup meets, several of them are held each year in various locations around the world.  There is no team or all-around competition at World Cups.  Instead athletes  compete for individual event titles, meaning gymnasts will compete on the events that they are strong at.

Gymnasts  also acquire points depending on how they finish at each World Cup competition (gymnasts can also accumulate points from World Championships and the Olympics).  Then, at the end of an Olympic cycle (usually a couple of months after the Olympics), all the points are tallied up and the top 10 finishers in points will compete at the World Cup Final.  However, from what I hear, the FIG (International Gymnastics Federation) has said that they will no longer hold the Final…for what reason I’m not too sure.  Either way, World Cup meets are good opportunities to get your name out in the international scene and to compete against World and Olympic medalists.

The down side to World Cups are they are the longest competition ever because so many countries enter the competition.  I remember going to one in Qatar last year and being at the gym for over 9 hours.  I feel like I was half asleep by my last routine on high bar.

Anyway, good luck to all the guys competing.  Go USA!