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Thursday, August 19

Patterson becomes queen of gymnastics

ATHENS, Greece — America's Sweetheart alert: Here's the newest cold-hearted, steel-willed, steady-nerved assassin in a U.S. uniform. All 97 pounds of her. And she's even old enough now to drive.

Come the Summer Olympics, the quickest way to America's heart is through the floor exercise mat. Which is why so many little girls went to bed Thursday night wanting to wake up as Carly Patterson.

It was not just any gold medal the little lady in red won. The all-around champion becomes the queen of gymnastics, and while the Nielsen ratings confirm this country loves to watch it, Olympic history suggests it hasn't been very good at winning it.

Let's see, there was Mary Lou Retton 20 years ago, with a perfect vault, and then disappearing into the bearish arms of coach Bela Karolyi, not to be seen again until her first television commercial.

And then ... uh ... nobody. Until now.

"I've worked my whole life to be Olympic champion," said Patterson, which is a sobering thought when it is uttered by someone who still giggles. "It's always been my dream."

Sure. But did the dream include the tall Russian drink of water sitting next to her in the victory news conference, grumbling about the judges?

I know you're probably shocked — shocked — to hear of a judging debate in gymnastics. Which really is figure skating without a Zamboni machine.

"If the judges were Greek, I would have no difficulty winning the gold medal," said Svetlana Khorkina, who once appeared in Maxim magazines all over Moscow. "They (the judges) are the ones who are going to have to live with their conscience."

Apparently, Khorkina thought she was judged too harshly on the beam, or maybe it was everywhere. The beam is when Patterson sailed by her, and then finished her off with a resolute floor exercise that had the air of a closer striking out the side in the ninth inning.

With Patterson seated next to her afterward, Khorkina only shrugged when asked to comment on the scores: "It's up to the judges to comment."

But once Patterson left the news conference, someone requested Khorkina's opinion of the difference between her and Patterson Thursday night.

"I am from Russia. I'm not from USA," she said.

And then she stuck out her tongue in something of a Bronx cheer.

"Just joking."

Oh.

The Cold War vestige aside, there are few things in the Olympics quite so impressive as a teenage munchkin who hardly changes expression over 90 minutes as she strangles the competition.

Someone asked Patterson to list the techniques in her routine Thursday night, and she crisply ticked them off like a broker reciting NASDAQ prices. From the dismount round-off, flip-flop double Arabian on the beam to the 2 1/2 layout on the mat.

For clearer English, even if it came with Romanian accent, we switch to Karolyi, Retton's coach and now more or less professor emeritus of U.S. gymnastics.

"American public is going to love her, her sturdiness, her characteristic fighting face," he said of Patterson.

It does not get better for an American woman gymnast than to have her name in the same sentence with Retton, who called Patterson from the United States to congratulate her.

"Very different as personalities, but one thing in common," Karolyi said of the two. "They are strong. They are tough. They would die to win.

"Mary was just like an open book. What was on her mind, that was on her mouth. Carly is little more sturdier, a little bit stubborn, a little bit more inside.

"But very strong-minded. Very dedicated. A hell of a competitor. A hell of a competitor."

Enough to torment Khorkina, nine years her senior, and two-time gold medalist on the uneven bars.

Upset Russians and happy Americans. If not that, it'd been the other way around. This felt like the Olympics.

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