Patterson wins gold in gymnastics

ATHENS, Greece - The 20-year wait is over. America has its new Mary Lou, and her name is Carly Patterson. Compare that to Khorkina, who was graceful and elegant in every sense, but stumbled ever so slightly during one pirouette and didn’t have the burst off the mat to go with her trademark flamboyance. When Patterson’s winning score was posted, coach Evgeny Marchenko lifted her on his left shoulder and paraded her in front of the fans — a champion’s chariot for a championship effort. “I don’t even know what to say right now,” Patterson said. “You dream about this your whole life. Then you win the gold medal. It’s just amazing.” The other American in the competition, Courtney Kupets, struggled all night and finished ninth. Last year at world championships, it was Khorkina edging out Patterson. Two moments stood out then: Khorkina leaving the floor and admitting she was uninterested while Patterson was performing the decisive routine on vault. Then, at the medalists’ news conference, Patterson stepping onto the podium to be greeted by Khorkina, who started flipping through a magazine to show the American her latest modeling pictures. An arrogant insult? Maybe so. “I just thought, ‘Whatever?”’ Patterson said last month. “I’ll go out and do my gymnastics and the best person will win.” She did just that. During the medals ceremony, Patterson sang along to “The Star-Spangled Banner,” played at the arena for the second straight night, and she looked to be blinking back tears. Khorkina, meanwhile, stared at the scoreboard and smiled at the fans, most of whom had come to see her. As she closed her night dancing to “Acropolis Adieu,” there was a sense that this was her time, and her arena. Once the music started, Khorkina was sexy, seductive, beautiful. Her tumbling passes were graceful and fluid, not the work of a pure jock but of a ballerina who simply works the jumps into the bigger show. But there were mistakes. Often in the past, they have been overlooked, a bow to a star who at times has seemed bigger than the sport. But when the score, a 9.562. popped up, Khorkina nodded knowingly. She had left the door open, and Patterson took advantage. Waiting for the start signal, Marchenko gave her a thumbs-up and she nodded back. The highlights of her routine had little to do with dance, and lots to do with jumping. On her third tumbling pass, she did two somersaults, and when they were complete, she was still hanging high enough that she could look down and pick the exact spot she wanted to land. She landed perfectly — on all four passes, and that was the difference between first and second. “I just knew I had to stick a good floor routine,” Patterson said. “After my last pass, I knew it.” Khorkina’s best event is uneven bars, and two rotations earlier, she scored a 9.725. Patterson answered with a 9.575, a much better effort than in team finals, when she got caught up during one of her spins and lost precious tenths of points that made the difference in America’s silver-medal showing against Romania. Two nights later, though, Patterson got her gold, and Americans found a new gymnastics star.