Shawn Johnson

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**Shawn Johnson**
Birthdate & location:	January 19, 1992 (1992-01-19) (age 16) Des Moines, IA
Residence:	Des Moines, IA
Current gym:	Chows Gymnastics
Current level:	Senior International Elite
Years on National Team:

Medal record
Gymnastics
World Championships Template:MedalGolb
Gold	2007 Stuttgart	All-around
Gold	2007 Stuttgart	Floor
Pan American Games
Gold	Rio de Janeiro 2007	Team Competition
Gold	Rio de Janeiro 2007	All-around
Gold	Rio de Janeiro 2007	Uneven Bars
Gold	Rio de Janeiro 2007	Balance Beam
Silver	Rio de Janeiro 2007	Floor

Shawn Johnson (born January 19, 1992 in Des Moines, Iowa) is an American gymnast. She is the 2007 World All-Around Champion, as well as the 2007 and 2008 U.S. National All-Around Champion.

1 Career
2 2007 World Championships
3 Injury
- 3.1 2008 Season
4 References
5 External links

[edit] Career

Shawn Johnson qualified to Junior International Elite status on her first attempt. She first attracted widespread attention at the 2005 US Classic, where she placed 3rd in the junior division.

At the 2005 National Championships, Johnson struggled on the first day of competition, falling from the beam and on the floor, and eventually placed tenth. By 2006, Johnson was ready with new skills, including a Jaeger on bars, a rarely-seen tucked full-in beam dismount, and an even rarer tucked double-twisting double back somersault on the floor exercise. She won the 2006 U.S. Junior National All-Around Champion with a score higher than any of the senior elite competitors that year. In 2007, Johnson entered the senior division, and continued to showcase new skills, including a double twisting double layout dismount off the uneven bars. She competed at the 2007 Tyson American Cup, claiming the All-Around title over her American teammates. She was also very successful in the 2007 Pan American Games, winning four gold medals (in the team finals, the individual all-around, and the balance beam and uneven bar finals) and one silver in the floor exercise final, making her the most successful gymnast of the games. She won the 2007 Visa National Championships, beating two-time National Champion Nastia Liukin by more than 5 points, and Shayla Worley (who was recovering from injury) by more than 3 points. She represented the U.S. in the World Championships, with teammates Liukin, Worley, Alicia Sacramone, Ivana Hong, and Samantha Peszek. The team placed first with 184.400 points, 0.95 point ahead of the silver medal Chinese team. Johnson competed on all four apparatus for the team competition. She went on to win the all-around competition with a score of 61.875.

For 2008, Shawn is upgrading all four of her events in her bid to become a member of the U.S. delegation to the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games. She is planning:

Vault - Amanar - originated by Simona Amânar [2 1/2 twisting, laid out yurchenko] - adding 0.7 in Difficulty.

Bars - Reverse Hect [tkatchev] - adding 0.2 in Difficulty.

Floor - A whip to a triple full (replacing her double pike pass) - adding 0.3 in Difficulty.

Beam - Front Pike - adding 0.1 in Difficulty.

[edit] 2007 World Championships

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Please improve this article if you can (April 2008).

Johnson competed in the 2007 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships. In the qualification round, she hit her beam (16.25), floor (15.15) and vault (15.175) routines cleanly, but had a fall on her bar dismount (14.625). The US finished first in the qualifying round despite that mistake. That fall kept Johnson from finishing first after the preliminaries; it nonetheless allowed her to advance to the all-around finals along with teammate Nastia Liukin. Johnson also qualified to the beam and floor event finals.

The team competition was also a good competition for Johnson with a few struggles. She hit her bar routine for a 15.375, her floor routine for the same score, but on beam she had a fall on her handspring-handspring-layout series, for a score of 15.02. The US also suffered another mistake on beam when Nastia Liukin was forced to change her dismount to a back tuck to keep from falling and injuring herself. The team pulled together for floor, however, with three hit routines to win the team gold medal for the second time in history, and the first time on foreign soil.

The all-around competition was the highlight of the championships for Johnson. She performed a clean double-twisting yurchenko vault for a 15.175, she performed a solid bar routine for a 15.375, performed an excellent beam routine with only a slight wobble on the handspring-handspring-layout pass she had fallen off on in the team competition for a 15.9, and finished with a floor routine for a 15.425, making her the 2007 World All-Around Champion, joining the short list of world all-around champions from the US: Kim Zmeskal, Shannon Miller, and Chellsie Memmel.

The first final she competed in was the balance beam, normally her best event, where she had a fall on her standing full and her switch side leap, earning a 14.475, and putting her in last place. She came back strong however, for the floor exercise finals, nailing every landing, earning a 15.25, and the world floor title.

Johnson walked away from the worlds with three gold medals. Two of her team mates- Alicia Sacramone and Nastia Liukin walked away with 2 medals also (Alicia-team, vault and floor and Nastia-team, bars and beam)

[edit] Injury

Shortly after Shawn returned from the 2007 World Championships, she suffered the first injury of her senior elite career. She suffered a stress reaction in her right leg which, if left untreated can lead to a stress fracture. She wore a cast for a few days and then had it replaced by a walking boot. She wore that for a few weeks, and scaled down her training. After that point, the injury was healed. She considers herself very lucky that that was the only injury that came out of the 2007 season.

[edit] 2008 Season

Shawn competed in the American Cup on March 1st, 2008 in Madison Square Garden. It was a very good meet for her, and an opportunity to attempt new elements she has been working on. Her first was on vault where she attempted her new 2 1/2 twisting Yurchenko vault. She had been working on them during the warm-ups and kept over-rotating, so she scaled it back during the meet in the hopes of sticking the vault. Unfortunately, she fell which cost her 0.8 points, but she still managed to receive a 15.175 for her score (the difficulty for a 2 1/2 twisting layed-out Yurchenko vault is a 6.5). She performed very well on her remaining three events, scoring a 15.625 on uneven bars, a 16.325 on balance beam and a 15.975 on floor exercise. She was ranked 1st on all her events except for uneven bars, but was still beat out of the all-around by 2 time American Cup Champion (2005-2006) Nastia Liukin. Nastia won mainly due to her 16.600 on uneven bars, which was nearly a point higher than Shawn's uneven bar score.

Literally one week later, Shawn competed at a more low-key competition in Jesolo, Italy against Italy, Spain, and Poland, with teammates Jana Beiger, Olivia Courtney, Chelsea Davis, Bridget Sloan, and Samantha Peszek. The USA took the junior and senior all-around team titles, and Shawn took the individual all-around title with 61.7 points to outscore second place winner Vanessa Ferrari (60.1.) Shawn also took the highest scores on three of four events, on vault (15.2), beam (16.2), and floor (15.0 with a big step out of bounds on her double-double.)

On June 7, 2008, Shawn competed and beat [Nastia Liukin] in the 2008 US Nationals, paving the way to a team effort taking them to the Olympic trials. The reigning world champion took the first round in a rivalry with teammate Nastia Liukin that is sure to captivate all the way through the Beijing Olympics, winning her second straight title at the U.S. gymnastics championships. Johnson finished with a score of 127.5, edging Liukin by one point. Notably, Liukin had a fall and went out of bounds her first day of competition. Liukin's AA total Day 2 was higher than Johnson's, although many gymnastics fans and commentators believe that Nastia was, in effect, heavily overscored on all her aparatus, and especially the Uneven Bars, where she took a very large deep squat, cowboyed legs, and large step on the dismount, yet still obtained a 9.4 Execution score.

The top 12 and others chosen by the selection committee now advance to the Olympic trials to be held on June 19-22 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The top two at trials earn spots in Beijing, with the remaining four members of the team and up to three alternates named after a July 20 selection camp at the Karolyi ranch.

Johnson, a 16-year-old junior-to-be — she finished her exams last Friday — is so solid she makes every event look easy, rather than the gravity-defying challenges they are. On the balance beam, she landed a series of aerial back handsprings as nonchalantly as if she was on a tarmac, not a 4-inch wide slab of wood that's 4 feet in the air. In August 2008, she has a very good chance of competing in the Beijing Olympic Games, and is one of the favorites to win the all-around title.