Sunisa Lee, the defending Olympic all-around gold medalist and uneven bars bronze medalist, might try a brand new talent on the 2024 Paris Video games.
The brand new ingredient in her uneven bars routine is a launch transfer wherein a gymnast does a entrance flip and a full twist within the structure place. Lee is in search of to be the primary girl ever to finish this transfer in worldwide competitors.
If she is ready to do it on the Video games, the talent — generally often known as a full-twisting Jaeger — can be christened “The Lee,” the primary talent to be named after her within the sport’s Code of Factors. A handful of expertise are usually named annually, however solely a really small variety of gymnasts will ever earn the excellence of a namesake.
“The Lee” can be probably the most tough components in girls’s uneven bars. Let’s take a more in-depth have a look at how she performs the transfer.
Every talent within the uneven bars occasion has a letter worth indicating issue, beginning with A and going via G, although Lee’s new talent has the potential to grow to be an H.
Jaegers, named for Bernd Jäger, confer with a household of strikes that encompass a 360-degree swing with a straight physique on the excessive bar and a launch right into a entrance flip earlier than catching the excessive bar once more. They are often straddled (D), piked (D) or laid out (F).
The structure Jaeger is known as a Cappuccitti (named for Stephanie Cappuccitti) and is never tried in competitors due to the problem of catching the bar. Lee’s transfer additional will increase the problem by including a full twist.
Notice: The Cappuccitti was carried out by Luo Rui. The complete-twisting Jaeger was carried out by Sunisa Lee.
Imagery by Worldwide Gymnastics Federation (Rui); The New York Occasions (Lee)
What makes Lee’s transfer significantly hanging is that she just isn’t making a variation on a distinct launch talent known as a Tkatchev, the route adopted by most uneven bars innovators in recent times.
Within the unique model — named for the Soviet gymnast Aleksandr Tkatchev — the gymnast swings across the excessive bar with a straight physique, releases it close to the apex of the swing, flies backward over the bar with legs straddled, and rotates the higher physique ahead to catch the bar once more.
Notice: Carried out by Gabby Douglas.
U.S.A. Gymnastics
The swing may be carried out with 5 physique positions, the flight may be carried out with three physique positions, and it’s also attainable to do a half-twist within the air. This implies there are not less than 30 permutations of the identical root talent.
Six new Tkatchev variants have been named within the final 4 years alone.
Whereas there are nonetheless some up for grabs, Lee selected to go a distinct route. It has been 18 years since anybody innovated on the Jaeger base. The Chinese language gymnast Li Ya was the final, introducing a Jaeger with a half twist in 2006.
In January, Lee posted movies on Instagram exhibiting her doing the brand new talent throughout a coaching session. It was an indication that she was getting again in kind after going through critical well being points for a lot of final 12 months.
Lee was recognized with an incurable kidney illness, which triggered extreme swelling in her face, fingers and legs, making it unimaginable to compete.
On her return to elite competitors, she tried the brand new talent on the Winter Cup in February however missed the ingredient throughout her bars routine and fell.
Due to how tough and dangerous the talent is, it isn’t sure whether or not Lee will try it with a medal on the road. However the Olympics in Paris will provide an opportunity to have the transfer named after her and to go away an indelible mark on the game.
