2011 US. VISA National Championships: Wieber and Leyva

Jordyn Wieber lived up to the hype and then some, winning her first title at the 2011 U.S. Artistic Gymnastics Championships in a rout Saturday night. Wieber finished with 121.30 points, 6.15 points ahead of McKayla Maroney. The 16-year-old from DeWitt, Mich., also finished with the highest scores on floor exercise and uneven bars.
Danell Leyva, who won his first U.S. title Friday night, was named to the American squad for the world gymnastics championships in Tokyo. Runner-up Jonathan Horton, John Orozco, Jake Dalton, Steve Legendre and Alexander Naddour also made the team.

* Men's competition
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Jonathan Horton and Danell Leyva were separated by 30 feet and three-tenths of a point as they stalked their respective events - high bar for Horton, parallel bars for Leyva - in the stretch drive Friday night of the USA Gymnastics men's national championships.
Leyva, the first-night leader, went first.


LEYVA  sailed through a world-class routine, nailed his dismount, clutched his fists and let out a loud whoop as he moved a step closer to his first all-around title. And then, as Leyva and the rest of the crowd at the Xcel Energy Center watched, Horton, the two-time defending national champion, walked up to the high bar, the apparatus on which he won a silver medal at the 2008 Olympics. Teen on top Horton began his routine, whipped twice around the bar to build momentum, then launched himself in the air for a release move called the Cassina, after the Italian gymnast who perfected the maneuver. As he descended, he reached for the bar, grabbed it ... and lost his grip. Horton picked himself off the floor and finished the routine, but the moment was lost, and so were his chances at a third title. Leyva, 19, the Cuban-born resident of Miami, won the title with a two-day score of 183.8 points, finishing the night by nailing another high-scoring, high-risk high bar routine.
Horton, 25, was second with 181.050 points. Both are headed for the world championships in October in Tokyo, but it is Leyva who will be, at least for the moment, the front man as the U.S. men's team prepares for the 2012 London Olympics.
Friday's title change, however, was not an awkward moment. Horton trotted to the side of the high bar platform and hugged Leyva, saying, "That's what we need. Team USA, right?" Leyva hugged back and, as the two parted, said, "Love you, Jonny." Leyva took the top step on the medals platform in large part because of his superior difficulty on parallel bars and high bar, on which he was the event's top scorer, and in part because he landed on his feet on 12 routines over two nights when Horton could not.
Horton was on the second step in large part because, for the second competition in a row, he came up short on one event. Wednesday, it was the pommel horse. Friday, it was high bar - arguably his best event, but also the one with the largest chance for miscues.
" I'll be back, and we'll battle it out again," Horton said.
Entering high bar, Horton had eaten up all but three-tenths of Leyva's 2.1-point first-night lead. Horton fell to fifth place on his second rotation after a watered-down rings routine to protect an ailing right shoulder. But then he hurled himself back into contention on vault with a 16.7 score on by landing a vault known as the Dragalescu - a handspring double-front somersault with a half-twist - that is one of the highest scoring in the gymnastics' scoring system. Brooks takes fourth That got Horton back into the race, but he lost points on high bar to end his hopes of another title. 
First-year senior John Orozco was third with 180.5 points, and Chris Brooks of Houston, the former Oklahoma gymnast who returned to his hometown earlier this year to train at Cypress Academy of Gymnastics alongside Horton, was fourth at 178.6. "In the short amount of time I've had to train, I'm pleased," Brooks said. "I think I'm on track for possibly making the world team." 
   >> All-around Men's Results