OKLAHOMA CITY — Responsible for one of the landmark achievements in U.S. gymnastics history, Kim Zmeskal still gets a thrill out of seeing who’s pushing the sport ahead. OKLAHOMA CITY — Responsible for one of the landmark achievements in U.S.
OKLAHOMA CITY — Responsible for one of the landmark achievements in U.S. gymnastics history, Kim Zmeskal still gets a thrill out of seeing who’s pushing the sport ahead.
She flips through every gymnastics magazine, looking for who’s doing innovative new tricks, wondering how coaches come up with them and marveling at the sport she’s come to love.
Two decades ago, it was Zmeskal who was making the big breakthrough, becoming the first American woman to win the all-around world title in 1991. That set the stage for the “Magnificent Seven” to win the country’s only team gold medal five years later at the Atlanta Olympics, and nowadays it’s common for the U.S. to produce some of the world’s top gymnasts.
Upon her induction to the International Gymnastics Hall of Fame this weekend, Zmeskal said it’s flattering when people approach her and say, “It started with you.”
But she doesn’t buy into it, insisting that she was only one of many who helped produce the boom in American gymnastics.
“It’s just exciting to see that the ball started rolling then, whether it was with me or before me,” Zmeskal said. “I’m very proud of all of the other teams, and I’m happy that I have stayed connected with it in one way or the other throughout this.
“I never left elite gymnastics, whether it was judging or athlete council or now coaching.”
Zmeskal now runs a gym, Texas Dreams, in the Dallas area and is coaching Olympic hopefuls like Kennedy Baker between running around with her husband, two sons and a daughter. And now she has a different perspective on the process of producing Olympic-caliber greatness.
“I love the life. It’s interesting because there’s a lot of similarities but there still feels like there’s growth within myself all the time,” Zmeskal said. “I learn from the girls, I appreciate things in my past from the girls. It’s a good life.”
Zmeskal’s world championship was part of a progression in American gymnastics that followed after Bela and Martha Karolyi came to the U.S. and built upon their reputation as the coach of Nadia Comaneci, the first gymnast to score a perfect 10 in the Olympics.
