[ GYMNASTICS ]
RICHARD WALKER / RWALKER@STARBULLETIN.COM
Blaine Wilson, a top-class gymnast in town promoting the upcoming Pacific Rim Gymnastics event, signed autographs at Hawaii Island Twisters in Kaneohe. Mackenzie Sato, Dominique Cooper, Tracie Tamashiro and Amanda Pascual looked on.
Wilson battles his way
toward AthensThe gymnast hopes to represent the
U.S. at the Olympics a third time
Olympic gymnast Blaine Wilson believes in fate. Wilson truly thinks that his life, with all the twists, flips and gut-wrenching moments, was meant to unroll the way it has.
Without fate, Wilson would have never gone to Ohio State, won an NCAA championship and gone on to his first Olympics in 1996. Nor would he have met his wife, Makare, a former University of Washington volleyball player, at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado.
"It was chance. That's all it was," said Wilson, who was in town to promote next month's Pacific Alliance Championships. "It was chance and fate, whichever way you want to look at it. I believe in fate. There's a lot of things throughout my lifetime."
His belief in that power hasn't wavered despite his life's latest turn. Wilson tore his left biceps tendon at the American Cup a month ago and will undergo surgery in three weeks. He won't compete at the Pacific Alliance Championships, but he expects to rehabilitate and be back in time for Athens.
"If you look at anything, better now than June (because) I have time," said Wilson, who has undergone five surgeries (three on his right shoulder, one on his left shoulder and a broken hand). "But at the same time I'm definitely asking myself why did this happen? The last three years of my career I've been in the best shape of my life ... I was ready to go this year and another bump in the road."
Those who know him don't doubt that Wilson will be in his third Olympics.
"Bottom line is that everybody believes if anybody can come back from this and make the Olympic team it's Blaine Wilson," USA gymnastics vice president Steve Penny said. "He's very optimistic about his recovery. Given his full recovery, everyone would anticipate a healthy Blaine Wilson will be on the team."
A healthy Wilson is in the best interest of a team looking to be a consistent contender with the international elite. His work ethic, fierceness and perseverance have been staples in a career that has lasted nearly a quarter of a century.
THE OLYMPICS are supposed to be the culmination of dreams and medals and sports glory. But Wilson knows that's not always true. He was inexperienced in 1996, and in 2000 he believes the U.S. didn't rest enough between the USA trials and Sydney. Wilson missed a bronze medal by .267 of a point. The U.S. finished fifth (of six teams) and Wilson was sixth in the all-around, the highest American finish.
"I think our team overtrained. ...There was really no rest," Wilson said. "I didn't feel right until almost all-around finals. For me that's unheard of. Normally I'm ready to go the first couple of days.
"The team competition is the best event for me. I made mistakes that I hadn't made in I don't know how many years throughout the routines."
Those mistakes roll easily off his tongue, as though they happened yesterday and not four years ago. An error on a tumbling pass on floor, an uncharacteristic hop on his landing after rings, a struggle through both bar routines. Nothing felt quite right. Wilson knew it wasn't his best and that has driven him to train more ferociously the last three years. What irks the two-time Olympian most is not performing well when it matters most.
The elusive medal made him come back for his fifth quadrennial (fourth on the senior national team). The five-time U.S. national champion (1996-2000) is one of the most decorated gymnasts in USA history. He is arguably one of the most important, despite not owning an all-around medal from the Olympics or the World Championships.
"It's not so much for the glory as for the whole deal," Wilson said. "To be able to say you and your team got the job done when it was time to do it. Anybody can win on those given days. You just have to be ready to go on those days.
"Everybody who goes to the Olympic games doesn't win a medal and that's what a lot of people don't know. (They think) you go to the Olympic games, you win a medal. It doesn't happen that way. To be able to say that you're a three-time Olympian ... just to close out my career at the 2004 games with a team medal would be outstanding."
His desire for an American team medal at the Olympics burns deep within him. Wilson has devoted his full attention to training and been apart from Makare, who is in California beginning a beach-volleyball career, and 1-year-old daughter Wakaya, who lives in Vancouver with Makare's mother.
The separation has not been easy for Wilson, who hasn't seen Wakaya in three months, but he knows it won't last forever.
And neither will his career. At 29, Wilson is the elder statesman of the U.S. team. He has already said this will be his last Olympics.
"He's so committed to the goal of being a three-time Olympian, he's rearranged his whole life in terms of his wife and his child," Wilson's coach, Miles Avery, said. "That tells you of the commitment he has to the team.
"He was not satisfied with his last Olympics. He wanted to prove that he can go to the Olympics and do a great job. Ultimately what's kept him around this long was helping this team win a team medal."
"There's a lot of misconception as far as the way people look at me," Wilson said. "I'm very confident with what I do, borderline cocky. If you don't have that, you're not going to be able to get it done.
"A lot of people look at me as an individual player, but it's quite the opposite. The better you are in the first two days of competition, the more individual event finals you'll have. You'll only make individual event finals by how much you help your team in prelims. Call it selfish, call it whatever you want. I've been a team player for years. That's why I went to college -- so I could compete with a team."
Wilson's competitiveness has been vital to the U.S.'s recent success in international gymnastics. He trains with the Hamm twins (Paul, who was the all-around winner at the Worlds last August, and Morgan), Raj Bhavasar and several other members of the U.S. national team at Ohio State. The group training has renewed Wilson's competitive drive and made him aware of how he needs to train to stay with the elite.
Not that his competitive fires needed that much stoking. Wilson concedes that even a random stranger on a cardio machine next to him at the gym can push him.
"When I get in there on that elliptical machine and someone's going faster, I have to step it up," Wilson said. "That little bit of motivation, knowing that somebody else might be working harder than you, that's the thing that pushes us.
"People can say whatever they want. I don't want to see any guy on that floor get hurt, but at the same time, if you screw up or make a mistake, I'm going to step on you to get over you."
His next step will be decided by Makare's budding beach career. Gymnastics has taken Wilson everywhere from South Africa to Sydney, but Makare will dictate the next destinations for the Wilson clan.
"I don't want to go another four years. I'll be 34 at the time," said Wilson. "I'd rather just stop and enjoy and watch my wife play. I can sit on the beach with my daughter and watch my wife play, no problem."
He can already envision life post-gymnastics. It will include lots of sunshine and golf, a sport that didn't agree with him initially but that he now plays at every opportunity.
"The more I played the more I got attached to it. I've been playing 10 years," said Wilson, who was introduced to gymnastics and golf by his father. "I thought it was weak. The first five years I was throwing clubs going, 'I hate this game.' Now I love this game. I just got into it. A lot of what draws me to golf is in gymnastics. It's all about stepping up and hitting a good shot. In gymnastics, if you're lacking in one event, pick it up in another event. I think that's why I like golf so much."
He can picture it for Wakaya. He sees tennis or golf in Wakaya's future. Gymnastics won't be in her future unless she wants it.
"She's already tall," said the 5-foot-4 Wilson, whose wife is 6-1. "The doctors say she'll be in the 5-8 to 5-10 range. She's going to outgrow daddy quick.
"I'd rather she play other sports. ... In all reality, she has a better chance getting a scholarship as far as tennis and golf. Even gymnastics, but if she's as tall as she's supposed to be, she's not going to be able to do that."
