Kerri Strug's Heroic Vault
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In the 1996 Olympics Women's Team Competition for Gymnastics, an event dominated by the Russians for decades and never won by the United States, the U.S. and Russian teams battled neck and neck. The Russians came into the team competition with a very narrow lead, but the U.S. had the benefit of being on their home turf. The event came down to the final rotation on the final day of the team competition, July 23.
With a record 40,000 spectators packed in the Georgia Dome for an early afternoon meet (held in the early afternoon to comply with requests of the European Broadcast Union), the United States turned in a nearly flawless performance that had the seemingly invincible Russians on the brink of defeat. In the final rotation, the U.S. women had already achieved a convincing victory due to their wide margin of the Russian team, but those on the floor believed that the U.S. team still needed a single good score on the vault to win gold. But Dominique Moceanu fell on both of her vaults, registering poor scores. Kerri Strug, who up to that point in her career had been overshadowed by better-known teammate Shannon Miller, was the last to vault for the United States.
Like Moceanu, Strug fell on her first attempt, and stood up, shaking out her ankle, which she had wrenched in her fall. She limped to the end of the runway for her second attempt. In a moment that would become one of the most famous of those Olympic Games, she landed the vault perfectly on one foot, sealing the women's team gold with a lofty score of 9.712. Strug raised her arms after her vault, saluting the judges, hopped around and raised them again, then collapsed in agony to the mat, grasping her ankle. She was helped off, to thunderous applause from the home crowd. Karolyi carried her onto the podium to join her team for the medal ceremony, after which she was treated at a hospital for two torn ligaments in the ankle. Due to her injury, she was unable to compete in the individual all-around competition and event finals, despite having qualified for both.
