Jan. 20, 2011

UCLA Gymnastics head coach Valorie Kondos Field will be answering your questions every Thursday over the course of the season. To submit questions for future Q&As, CLICK HERE.

This week's questions/answers:

Jane (D.C.) - Tim Daggett called Zam's elite FX choreo "bizarre." Then chalked it up to NCAA choreo being all about "entertainment." How do you respond?
Miss Val - I believe NCAA floor routines do have more of an "entertainment" quality to them than most Elite routines. Isn't "Entertainment" the whole point of athletics? Sports are nothing without fans, and fans want to be entertained. It makes even more sense that if there is an event in a sport such as Floor Ex. with music and choreography that it lends itself to an "entertainment" quality.

Sophie (Orange County, CA) - Your schedule is so different this year and you're not competing against UGA. Why the change in schedule? I love that Minnesota and Denver are coming!
Miss Val - We are competing against UGA. They are joining us on March 6th with Arizona. The difficult part about scheduling outside of our conference is trying to find dates that work with other schools because we ALL have to fulfill our conference obligations first.

Kirsten (Harrisburg, PA) - So many elites come to NCAA severely injured and some never able to perform. Do you have reservations about recruiting elites?
Miss Val - Recruiting is a crap shoot. You really never know what you will get. Yvonne Tousek had 13 bone chips in each of her ankles, and we never thought she'd be able to compete for us as much as she did. Who would have thought that after sitting out two years that Kristen Maloney would finish her career competing as well as she did? And so on ...

Wendy (Pearl City, Hawaii) - Many programs do not allow their student athletes to take classes during practice, but you seem more flexible. How do you decide who can miss practice?
Miss Val - The only time a student-athlete is allowed to miss training for a class is when they have no other choice. This comes up a lot with our pre-med majors. They have to take their classes in sequence, so they don't have much flexibility with their class schedule. Brittani McCullough has had NO flexibility with her nursing schedule, and she's made it all work out.

Elizabeth (Gaithersburg, MD) - At the PAC-10 meet the athletes were wearing numbers on their thighs. This might be safer than numbers on backs but not pretty. Is this here to stay?
Miss Val - I couldn't agree with you more. So much less hassle than pinning #'s to their back, but oh-so not attractive. I think for the PAC-10 Championships they are going to do the tattoos again only with fewer #'s. We'll see.

David (West Hollywood, CA) - I love the pre-meet entertainment. It feels like I am at the theater. Where do you find these acts and what performances are planned this year?
Miss Val - Thank you. I always vacillate as to whether we should keep doing pre-meet entertainment, but every year I get a lot of positive feedback that people really like it so we're keeping it for now. We get the acts from all over Los Angeles. In fact, we have gotten quite a few acts over the years from the street performers at the 3rd St. Promenade in Santa Monica.

Diane (Indianapolis, IN) - Is there a place you have always wanted to take the team to compete but have not yet? Any plans to have a meet in conjunction with an elite meet?
Miss Val - YES - ALASKA! I love going to new places, and I've heard Alaska puts on a great meet. Even though we were less than stellar this past weekend, SUU hosted a fantastic meet. Their arena was packed, they did a really good job with the pre-meet production, and the energy in the gym was huge. We just didn't do our job.

Mary (Quebec, Canada) - Aisha is such an amazing dancer. Will she do floor? What is her major and does she have any plans to dance and perform professionally after college?
Miss Val - Yes, we put Aisha in the All-Around this past weekend to see if her ankles could handle it. And YAY! She did just fine. She will hopefully be competing in the All-Around for us quite a bit the remainder of the season. She is a World Arts & Culture major with a dance emphasis.

Bill (San Francisco) - Dear Miss Val - Your Bay Area Bruins love you and the Women's Gymnastics team!! When I was at UCLA, I was lucky enough to watch Sharon Shapiro and Diane Dovas compete - they were amazing. Do you think it matters if your current student athletes know about Bruins who competed 20 or 30 years ago?
Miss Val - I bring back our Bruin alumnae all the time. Sharon has been around our team a lot. I feel it's really important for our team to know their history. So if any of you Bruin alumnae are ever in town, please let me know so I can introduce you to our team and have your share some Bruin history with them.

Rachael (Seattle) - Hi Miss Val, I am wondering where to find some UCLA gymnastics gear (t-shirts or sweatshirts). The online UCLA store only has other sports such as basketball, volleyball, soccer, and golf. Where can non-local fans find some gear and show our support? Thanks and good luck this season!
Miss Val - I just checked with the UCLA Store, and they do have UCLA Gymnastics apparel online. At the moment all they have is the national championship t-shirt from last year, but they are going to be adding an adidas UCLA Gymnastics shirt soon.

Melissa (San Diego) - What is going on with all of the injuries? It seems like there are more already this year than ever before.
Miss Val - Injuries in any sport are always a mystery. However, I do believe that when athletes train with a crystal-clear purpose the injuries are less. So many times athletes mistake training "hard" with training "smart". Training smart requires knowing your goals and having a clear purpose and applying meaning to every little thing you do. With that said, some of the injuries we've had this year are simply part of being an athlete. I feel that Vanessa and Mizuki's injuries fall into that category because they got injured doing focused gymnastics.

Jules (Los Angeles) - I was wondering if you will keep Talia in the floor line-up for upcoming meets? She obviously did a superb job this past weekend, and as a fan I would love to see her compete more often!
Miss Val - That's our goal. Talia has worked diligently for 4 years to get tumbling passes that would get her in the line-up. She's finally there and able to compete with confidence. We'll have to see if she can consistently score well. If so, she's in.