1984 American Cup - Women - Full Broadcast

March 18, 1984 - Madison Square Garden - New York, N.Y.

[@alexhooper5873]

I wish gymnastics would revert back to the old way with the uneven bar routines. These were so adventurous and unique. Todays routines all look the same, they’re bloody boring. Bring back old style of bars!

[@taminator664]

Gotta love Mary Lou. I know that gymnastics has evolved and become much more difficult in the past 30 years but Mary Lou still stands out because of her amazing execution. Such strong attention to detail on every single skill/move. I also loved Julianne's bar routine. Her stalder work and preciseness is amazing.

[@jmorg044]

mary lou was ok

[@bobbarns4516]

You’ve got to be kidding. She’s very sloppy! 😐

[@saragrant9749]

For the time, she was incredible. Execution is what won her all around gold ultimately. For those who say she only won because the USSR wasn’t there- who cares. It means the judging wasn’t bought and paid for!

[@Beargeek616]

That McNamara mount is soooo difficult! Julianne was so underrated.

[@sfhayesvalley]

Julianne McNamara's mount on bars was amazing. I'd like to see someone do the free hip mount to a release move. She doesn't get enough credit for how good she was.

[@metsdudenj]

That mount is called a stem mount and it is the hardest mount in the books, no other woman has done it that I am aware of

[@lisastiles1408]

Without the 1980 boycott I believe she would have been much better known.

[@kras118]

Cutina's wolf turn into the low beam sequence was magnificent. so beautiful

[@MissLilRedRooster]

Mary Lou has one of the most dedicated sprinting styles in gymnastics, haha. She is just so into it whenever she gets going.

[@greenwolfegreen6028]

Even the commentators seemed to understand that Mary Lou was a great gymnast and had a great chance to do some special things in Los Angeles.

[@sarahj2106]

Mary Lou started this routine with a double layout just like her daughter does now in college gymnasts ❤️

[@06UH]

One thing I love about Mary Lou is that she had so much power that she rarely had to "cowboy" her legs Also she seemed to have problems with that gainer layout on beam in the Olympic aa as well I wonder why they didn't change it if it wasn't very strong and too much of a risk but I haven't seen many competitions with her in them so it could have been more consistent than it seemed

[@lisastiles1408]

I’m more than half way through, past the Bela interview, and it’s like Diane Durham never existed. Not a single mention…

[@kaylajones4356]

Go Julianne McNamara! PERFECT TEN!

[@LETMEINGUYS]

Where Mary Lou had legs for days Julianne had a TON of upper body strength

[@mindyschocolate]

Her bars were super strong. Her bars could have stood up 10 years later.

[@pappysprite]

I can't believe how unprofessional it used to be. To watch Mary Lou's beam routine not on a podium and the audience is right next to the beam and the judges are sitting amongst the audience. It's hard to believe actually. I love Mary Lou, but she was very over-scored here, especially on bars. Her bars release had a major form break with a severe bent knee and was extremely noticeable.

[@metsdudenj]

Laura Cutina was also over scored, but the SCamerican Cup always was like that. Everyone was a winner it seemed

[@LETMEINGUYS]

I used to think that about Kerry Strug but the more I watch her beam routine back at the 96 Olympics I realized that her quads are so incredibly huge it just looks like they were bent. And we all know Mary Lou's known for her dominating NFL quarterback legs muscles.

[@doublearabianpunchlayout7703]

Dude the bars are so close together. For some reason it always bothered me when they touch their legs to the bars, probably because I started watching when that was forbidden

[@megameganism]

i'm so glad belly beats went away.

[@evanbadertscher1737]

Megan Laplante True always hatred them

[@TheAbxgirl]

the bruises to perfect that move was crazy...

[@makaylalovesgymnastics]

Wolf turns even back then

[@searanch32]

I love how during Mary Lou's bar routine, she looks to the right during the middle of her release move, the Retton, in order to find the bar.

[@Lps-pr7rl]

May Lou's BB routine completely hides the fact that she has trouble obtaining 180 degree split positions. No back handsprings or lay outs or aerial walkovers. No handstand difficulty except after the mount. Shows a straddle split, however, but not 180 degree split. Well hidden.

[@metsdudenj]

the routine was made cleverly to hide her lack of flexibility, which she clearly admitted in an interview. However, she did two split leap jumps in LA which were pretty elevated. You are right, the skills were all power moves, front and back tucks. Her backhand springs on beam, which she added in 1985, were not very attractive.

[@cullerjones]

@@metsdudenj The Strauses could have taken a page out of the Karolyi's playback to choreograph to play up a gymnasts strengths and not their weaknesses. Something they seemed clueless on when it came to their own gymnasts, even the successful ones. Them having Spivey do so many split jumps in a row on beam, LOL! The only smart thing they ever did was have Kim Kelly do only straddle jumps and never a true split jump to try and hide as best they could her none existing flexability.

[@googlebox]

I don't see how Mary-Lou scored 9.75 with a fall on floor. It's just nuts.

[@SammyMackD]

+Ritteltits Back then they only took off like .2 for that. But everyone in the competition was judged like that so it was fair

[@06UH]

They didn't count a hand down as a fall back then, it was only a 0.2 deduction and the rest was pretty much perfect by their standards from then

[@melissakerber8287]

She made the same error, although more pronounced during the team optionals, and the judges awarded her a 9.9.

[@amymarie8169]

@usagymnasticsorg can you upload the full broadcast of the 1996 McDonald's American cup.

[@wiscovirgo]

my mom said she developed very serious pelvic issues after she quit gymnastics because of the stomach grips on UB. im glad those are no longer around in the sport, they just looked painful 😖😖

[@alexhooper5873]

No they weren’t painful at all. You had to have the bars individually set back in those days so that the distance between the bars were the perfect fiti for your own body length to make those moves comfortable. The bar had to hit you basically where your top thigh met the hip joint, not the hip bone, but the part just under the hip bone. You didn’t really feel anything unless the bar was the wrong distance. I remember getting bruises a lot at first, until your body got used to it. Kind of like our hands getting used to the bars, before the days of hand grips. Occasionally i remember sporting skinned hips, just like a skinned knee but like i said it never hurt as long as you had the bars set at your correct body distance. This would adjust every time you grew of course. We used to have little wind up knobs on the adjustable rod that held the two bars together. This would allow you to adjust the distance like reading a tape measure. I remember one of my early gyms having wooden bars instead of the new fibreglass bars. These wooden ones actually did hurt because there was absolutely no flex to the bars at all. Once the fibreglass bars were brought in as common practice it became painless because the bars moved with your body and you were able to rebound freely without the full impact of smashing into the wooden bars. Hope this makes sense.

[@russcohen3779]

Loved gymnastics back then

[@biff481]

So much respect for Mary Lou.💯 But her fx score...yea, no. ✖️.

[@MrMartinportnoy]

Jay Bee her 9.95 on bars was another huge joke after Topalova's 9.65.... but then the American Cup was Mary Lou's show at the time

[@Sknastics]

@@MrMartinportnoy I was thinking the same thing about the scores.

[@lisajansen5616]

And that 9.75 for Julianne on floor was ridiculous after stumbling off the floor on her second run. And actually so was the 9.3 on beam after basically two falls.

[@isaxo718]

Did they have spring floors here?

[@brenden6218]

Why did everyone from the 80s sound like that 1:51

[@TripleFull]

Yes, but the floors were nothing like today.

[@frugalfruit3792]

Somewhat, but they aren't nearly as springy as today's.

[@aniyeats]

lol he says apparti

[@lvega5606]

Latin is a difficult language. At least I'm sure he could spell better than a first grader...

[@Вова_Анна]

👍❤️

[@brianpatterson1827]

Cutina deserved 2nd place. McNamara should've been deducted even more on floor with underrotating and the several steps back and out of bounds. But with Cutinas couple breaks was at least scored relevantly. I can't stand Cathy Rigby ...how annoying was she!!!

[@chitownlokito]

I agree.. her and that other Canadian commentator... what’s her name? Elfo Schlegel. Always negative

[@lvega5606]

I prefer analysts to be realistic rather than ignore any mistakes and only talk about the good things in the routine.

[@abrahaobambam]

A laura foi injustiçada

[@amyaugustine1656]

BoDy WaVe??!!!!!!

[@AFLandTPgirl]

Mary lou dose deserve to win beacause i diden't know how she could do that retton filp and that round of dobble back of the beam and that juilanna got a 10.00 on the uneven bars and trobbleon the beam of that 9.30 i feel bad but i think that she got a 10.00 on vailt i just want to crongrat mary lou for that and close on the bars a 9.95 that was so close to a perfact ten i hope she can do better at the olimpics and julianna mcmara.

[@zeelelynn]

Uggh I hate the “ round off flip flop”

[@abrahaobambam]

Messa epoca os juizes ou eram comprados ou bonzinhos demais pq a menina cai na trave tora notas acima dos 9 e no solo a outra tbm colocou as maos e nao cravou um dos elementos mesmo assim teve nota alta...

[@melissakerber8287]

The deductions for certain mistakes vary from quad to quad because of a different code of points. This was also during an Era when the scoring was on the higher end.

[@chitownlokito]

SHUT UP!!! Kathy Rigby.

[@stevemondini8778]

AC

[@Leslieeeezss]

Holy shit gymnastics is so different than it is now.

[@melissakerber8287]

Cutina should have gotten a higher score on beam.