Bridget Sloan

Bridget Sloan
— Gymnast —
Sloan performs on the balance beam at the 2008 U.S. National Championships in Boston, MA.
Personal information
Full name	Bridget Elizabeth Sloan
Country represented	United States
Born	(1992-06-23) June 23, 1992 Cincinnati, Ohio
Hometown	Pittsboro, Indiana
Residence	Gainesville, Florida
Height	4 ft 11 in (1.50 m)
Weight	104 lbs (47 kg)
Discipline	Women's artistic gymnastics
Level	Senior International Elite
Club	Sharp's Gymnastics Academy
College team	Florida Gators
Head coach(es)	Marvin Sharp
Music	Araba (2008-2009), Harem (2010-2011), Hup (2012), Till I Collapse (2013
Medal record Women's gymnastics Competitor for the  United States Summer Olympics Silver 2008 Beijing Team World Championships Gold 2009 London All-Around Silver 2010 Rotterdam Team Pan American Games Gold 2011 Guadalajara Team Pacific Rim Championships Gold 2010 Melbourne Team American Cup Silver 2009 Chicago All-Around Visa Championships Gold 2009 Dallas All-Around Gold 2009 Dallas Uneven Bars Gold 2009 Dallas Floor Exercise Silver 2007 San Jose Floor Exercise Bronze 2008 Boston Uneven Bars

Bridget Elizabeth Sloan (born June 23, 1992) is an American gymnast. She is the 2009 All-Around World Champion and the 2009 All-Around U.S. National Champion. Sloan was a member of the silver medal U.S. women's gymnastics team at the 2008 Summer Olympics. As of 2013, Sloan is a member of the NCAA University of Florida team, in addition to being the NCAA All-Around and Beam Champion.

Early life and career

Bridget Sloan was born on June 23, 1992, in Cincinnati, Ohio. She began gymnastics in 1996 when she was 4. She currently lives in Pittsboro, Indiana, and graduated from Tri-West Hendricks High School. She trains at Sharp's Gymnastics Academy in Indianapolis, Indiana alongside 2008 Olympic Team Member Samantha Peszek.

2007

In her first year as a senior, 2007, Sloan placed 5th all-around and 3rd on Bars at the U.S. National Championships. She served as the alternate on the American team for the 2007 World Championships. Sloan also represented the United States at the Good Luck Beijing Olympic test event in December 2007, where she won the bronze medal in the all-around and a silver on floor exercise.^[1]

2008

In March 2008, Sloan suffered a torn meniscus while warming up at a meet in Italy.^[2] She was forced to sit out the competition and returned home for surgery and rehabilitation, but recovered in time to compete at the 2008 U.S. National Championships, where she competed only on beam, bars and floor; and the U.S. Olympic Trials. Sloan was named to the U.S. team after the final selection camp in Houston in July 2008.^[3]

At the 2008 Olympics, Sloan competed in both the qualifying and team final rounds of competition. Her contributions to the team became critical in the qualifying round, where the Americans were forced to put up only four athletes on three events, and count all four scores, due to injuries to Chellsie Memmel and Samantha Peszek. Sloan made small errors on floor and uneven bars but performed well under pressure.^[4] Her all-around scores placed her 11th overall among all competitors.^[5] In the team finals, Sloan competed on vault, contributing a 15.200 score to the American team's silver medal win.^[6][7]

2009

In February 2009, Sloan competed in the Tyson American Cup and placed second to 13-year-old Jordyn Wieber. In August, Sloan competed in the US Nationals and had a shaky preliminary competition. However, her consistency in the finals won her the gold medal in the All-Around, Floor and Uneven Bars.

In October at the 2009 London World Championships, after a shaky preliminary round, Sloan qualified 5th for the all-around and 7th for the uneven bars final. In the all-around final, she won the gold medal over teammate Rebecca Bross by 0.050. Sloan earned her place in gymnastics history as the fifth American woman to win the World all-around title. In the bars final, she placed 6th.

2010

Injuries plagued Sloan throughout the year, greatly limiting her in competitions. An ankle injury early in the year limited her participation in the Pacific Rim Championships to bars. The same injury kept Sloan to the beam at the CoverGirl Classic. A new pectoral injury prevented her from defending her National all-around title. At Nationals she performed two tentative beam routines, one that included a fall, and placed 11th on the apparatus. However, Sloan impressed National Team Coordinator Márta Károlyi with her improvement at the selection camp, and was brought to the World Championships to perform on bars and floor, placing fourth in the bars final.^[8][9][10]

2011

Sloan sat out the majority of the competitive season while recovering from surgery on her bicep. She stated that it was unlikely she would take part in the 2011 National or World Championships in an effort to stay healthy for the 2012 season, her ultimate goal being the 2012 Olympics.^[11]

Although Sloan did not compete in the 2011 National Championships, she later headed to the Karolyi Ranch in New Waverly, Texas, to participate in both selection camps for the 2011 World Championships team. She was subsequently named to the team for the 2011 Pan American Games.^[12] She competed only on the uneven bars and floor exercise in Guadalajara, and scored in the thirteens on both apparatus. She failed to qualify for either of the event finals, even though on uneven bars it was due to the "two [athletes] per country" rule (Bridgette Caquatto and Shawn Johnson both scored higher than her).

2012

As a result of Sloan's injuries and her participation for the USA team at the Pan American Games the previous year, she was able to successfully petition a spot at the U.S. National Championships. She had intended to compete at Classics, but decided not to out of respect for her coach, who would have been unable to attend the Classic as he was attending his father's funeral.^[13] At the championships, she performed in all four events for the first time since 2009, coming 6th on the Uneven Bars and 10th in the All-Around.^[14] She was chosen to compete at the Olympic Trials. During the first night of the Olympic Trials, she injured her elbow during bars warmup and was forced to withdraw due to the injury, subsequently ending both her chances at the London Olympic Games and her national team career.^[15]

College

Sloan currently attends the University of Florida, signing her national letter-of-intent with the Gator Gymnastics team.^[16] Sloan deferred enrollment at the university until the 2012 fall semester, which allowed her to seek a second consecutive spot on the U.S. Olympic team for the 2012 Summer Olympics.^[17] Due to injury, Sloan was forced to withdraw from the 2012 Olympic Trials, and rejoined 2010 World Championship teammate Mackenzie Caquatto on the Florida team.

In 2013, at her first NCAA Championship with the Florida team, Sloan captured the All-Around title with a score of 39.600.^[18] She then led her team to their first NCAA Championship title, scoring 39.75 all-around.^[19] In event finals, Bridget also won the beam title.^[20] Bridget is an 8 time All-American, (First Team in All- Around, Bars, Beam and Floor at NCAA Championship competition and First Team for All Around, Bars and Beam and Second Team in Vault in the first National Association of Collegiate Gymnastics Coaches (NACGC) All-America regular-season awards)^[21] On 29 April Sloan was named as the 2013 recipient of the Honda Award (only the 4th Freshman in the Awards 37 year history and the 2nd consecutive Florida Freshman to win the award)^[22]

Olympic Routines

As of 2008, Sloan performed the following skills on each apparatus (from 2005-2008 CoP):

Vault

5.8 Difficulty Start Value for the Vault.

Double Twisting Yurchenko (round-off, backhandspring entry, double twisting layout.

Uneven Bars

6.7 Difficulty Start Value for the Routine.

Glide KCH + Toe-on with 1/2 turn (C) + Endo 1/2 (C) + Toe-on shoot to high bar (B); KCH 1/2 + giant + Stalder 1/1 (D) + Straddled Tkatchev (D); KCH + Piked Stalder (D) + Toe-on to Counter Straddle Reverse Hecht (Ray) (E); KCH + Toe-on to handstand (C) + Overshoot to handstand (D) + Stalder shoot to high bar (Ray) (C); KCH + giant + giant + 1/1 Double Layout Dismount (E).

Balance Beam

6.5 Difficulty Start Value for the Routine.

Press to handstand to clear pike support mount (C); Front Aerial Walkover (D) + Aerial Cartwheel (D); Full turn with leg at horizontal (C); Front Tuck (D); BHS step-out (B) + Layout step-out (C); Switch Split Leap (C) + Back Tuck (C) + Sheep Jump (D); Free Walkover to Arabesque (D); Split Jump (A) + Wolf Jump (A); Round-off (B) + Double Pike Dismount (E).

Floor Exercise

6.3 Difficulty Start Value for the Routine.

Round-off + Back Layout 3/2 (C) out to Round-off + Flip Flop two-feet + Back Layout 3/1 (E); Round-off + Flip Flop two-feet + Piked Full-In (E); Switch Split Ring Leap (C) + Split Leap 1/1 (C); Front Handspring + Front Layout 2/1 (Tarasevich) (D); Triple Spin with leg below horizontal (C); Round-off + Back Layout 2/1 (C); Straddle Jump 1/1 (Popa) (C); Round-off + Flip Flop two-feet + Double Pike (D).

Competitive history

Senior career

Floor music

2008: Araba (Instrumental Version) by Mustafa Sandal

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Bridget Sloan .

• Official website
• Sloan on Twitter
• Bridget Sloan at Fédération Internationale de Gymnastique
• Bridget Sloan at USA Gymnastics
• Bridget Sloan at the United States Olympic Committee

v t e 2008 USA Olympic Gymnastics Team (Bronze Medal – Men's Team, Silver Medal – Women's Team) Men's artistic gymnastics athletes Alexander Artemev Raj Bhavsar Joseph Hagerty Jonathan Horton Justin Spring Kevin Tan Women's artistic gymnastics athletes Shawn Johnson Nastia Liukin Chellsie Memmel Samantha Peszek Alicia Sacramone Bridget Sloan Rhythmic gymnastics athletes DNQ Trampoline athletes Chris Estrada Erin Blanchard Coaches Liang Chow (Head Women's artistic gymnastics coach) Márta Károlyi (Assistant Head Women's artistic gymnastics coach) Valeri Liukin (Women's artistic gymnastics coach) XueYi (Peter) Zhao (Women's artistic gymnastics coach) Mihai Brestyan (Women's artistic gymnastics coach) Marvin Sharp (Women's artistic gymnastics coach) Andy Memmel (Women's artistic gymnastic coach)