Just over three years removed from competing in the 2021 U.S. Olympic gymnastics trials, MyKayla Skinner sat relatively comfortably inside her home in American Fork Friday night alongside her husband Jonas Harmer and their daughter Charlotte — the latter is just beginning to figure out how to stand — and watched former teammates such as Simone Biles, Sunisa Lee, Jordan Chiles and Jade Carey compete in the 2024 trials.
During a two and a half hour virtual watch party on YouTube that Skinner hosted, the Olympic silver medalist weighed in on anything and everything related to Friday night’s competition, the first of the two-night Olympic trials that will determine the American women’s Olympic team for the Paris Games this summer.
Amid critiques of routines and skills and postulation about what the American team will end up looking like, Skinner shared her feelings about her own Olympic experience, her future in the sport of gymnastics and much more.
The former University of Utah star is done competing as a gymnast, she made that clear — well she may have been jokingly opaque about it — but the sport remains a part of her.
What the Olympic trials were like for MyKayla Skinner
Friday night’s competition was a whirlwind, with two genuine contenders to make the U.S. team getting eliminated due to injury: Kayla DiCello with an Achilles injury and Shilese Jones with a knee injury.
That opened the door for other gymnasts who may not have otherwise had a real shot at making the team this year, and though some rose to the occasion, others struggled Friday, which only served to remind Skinner of the pressures of competing at the trials, which she did in 2016 and again in 2021.
“It was so freaking stressful,” she said again and again, struggling a bit to convey exactly what the weight of the competition felt like as a gymnast.
“There was so much stress and pressure that it was honestly such a blur,” Skinner said. “The pressure of this competition is insane. It is so weird being on the other side of it (now).”
Skinner recalled how she dreaded competing on balance beam and had to fight herself to keep the thought of that event out of her head throughout the competition.
“I was worried about myself and tried to focus on each event,” she said. “Beam really gets me the most nervous and all I could think about the whole meet was, ‘Oh, I don’t want to go to beam,’ because my beam routine was hard and stressful, but I knew if I was ever going to make the team I had to hit that beam routine so I had to not get ahead of myself and focus on one event at a time.”
Skinner also reminisced about arguably her best event — floor exercise — and how at Olympic trials she competed it so hard and there was so much riding on her performance that she struggled to breathe afterward.
“I put so much energy on floor that after I was done I couldn’t breathe,” she said. “Just the pressure, anxiety, putting all my effort in.”
It wasn’t all bad, though.
The U.S. Olympic trials are practically the only competition of Skinner’s elite career where she competed in front of tens of thousands of fans, and as she tells it, every one of those fans is actively cheering for every gymnast.
It is a unusual environment in sports. Unforgettable even for Skinner.
“I was glad to be pumped up with the crowd,” she said. “Everyone there is pumped up to cheer for you. That is the cool thing about Olympic Trials.
“Everyone there is cheering on every person to make the team and that is really special. There is nothing else that feels that incredible in that moment. I remember after every event trying to soak that in.”
Empathizing with injured Olympic hopefuls
The injuries to DiCello and Jones on Friday were devastating.
DiCello had deferred a season of college gymnastics at Florida to pursue a spot on the U.S. team headed to Paris and seemed to be in prime position to achieve that goal, only to have her pursuit end abruptly during the first rotation of the night on vault.
As for Jones, she had struggled with injuries throughout the year, skipping the U.S. championships with a shoulder injury, but appeared primed to make the Olympic team as one of the country’s best overall gymnasts until she injured her knee during vault warmups.
Not to be forgotten is Skye Blakely, the 19-year rising star who arguably had been better than any American not named Simone Biles in the lead-up to the trials. She injured her Achilles on Wednesday during podium training ahead of the trials.
In a fair world, all three women would have competed Friday night. Instead all had to watch from the sidelines, their dreams squashed in particularly painful fashion.
Skinner never suffered an Olympic dream ending injury, but she did have her own struggles, with COVID-19 pushing back the Olympics a year — nearly causing her to give up on the dream then and there.
And then she suffered an Achilles injury while training for the Olympics, an injury that for a time threatened her ability to compete. There was a time when she thought her career was over, dreams unfulfilled.
Watching injuries befall Blakely, DiCello and Jones brought back difficult feelings for Skinner.
“We need to say prayers for the girls,” she said. “I don’t want anybody getting hurt. That is the worst. … I feel so bad for Skye. Skye was in my rotation in the (2021) Olympic Trials and it was so sad because she got hurt on vault.
“I’ve really been rooting for her since I retired. She is such an amazing athlete and has so much potential and I was really hoping she would make the team this year. … I love Kayla and it breaks my heart so much. I would’ve loved to see Kayla on the Olympic team.
She later added, “I can’t get over what is happening to everybody. I had so much hope and it is really sad. I know how these girls feel. I didn’t get hurt at Olympic trials, but with COVID, that postponement, and my Achilles injury, I thought my dream was over. It just sucks, so I can’t even imagine how they feel.”
The elite to NCAA to elite journey
Skinner famously competed elite gymnastics and was an alternate for Team USA at the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro in 2016. She then ended her elite career — or was thought to, at least — when she enrolled at the University of Utah and began competing for the Red Rocks.
After three years in Salt Lake City, though, Skinner elected to cut her college career short and make a run at another Olympics, a journey that worked out in the end, with her making it to Tokyo and winning a silver medal on vault.
Multiple gymnasts currently competing for a spot in the Paris Games followed Skinner’s path.
Chiles and DiCello both deferred their sophomore seasons in college — at UCLA and Florida, respectively — to train exclusively for an Olympic spot.
Lee followed Skinner’s example and retired from NCAA gymnastics altogether after two years at Auburn. Carey and Leanne Wong, meanwhile, competed at the NCAA level this past season while simultaneously training for the Olympics.
Watching so many gymnasts attempt something similar to what she did left an impression on Skinner.
“It is really cool to see these athletes try and do what I did,” she said. “I know there have been gymnasts in the past go from college back to elite, but not very many have been successful. It was really cool for me to make my comeback, do what I did and show these athletes that they can do it.
“You still need to train a lot of hours, but you really need to focus on in taking care of your body and not overdoing. It has been really cool to see these athletes do elite and college. I still think it is really hard to do both at the same time. I really do think you should take the time to just focus on elite, but it is really cool that more athletes are able to do this and pursue both.”
Is there a future in gymnastics for MyKayla Skinner?
With so much uncertainty about what the American team will look like for Paris after the injuries to Blakely, DiCello and Jones, Skinner joked that she should have made another comeback, coming out of retirement like Biles for the Paris Games.
“This makes me want to go and compete again,” she said. “I don’t, but this is making me want to compete again. Watching this makes me want to come out of retirement.”
More seriously, though, Skinner is very content with life post-gymnastics.
“I really haven’t missed gymnastics that much,” she said. “As we’ve gotten closer to the Olympics, or when (the world championships) are coming up I’ve gotten kind of sad and emotional, because it brings back all those memories.
“Obviously I ended (my career) on a good note and for me moving on from gymnastics has been so easy and I am living my best life.”
Still, Skinner admitted she does wish her Olympic experience had been a little more normal.
“Sitting here watching this and commentating about it does make me sad that I’m not there,” she said, “and watching how everything is so different. I was an alternate in 2016 and I didn’t get to stay in the (Olympic) village. I didn’t get to do what the Olympic team got to do.
“Now seeing the build up to 2024, all the things they’ve gotten to do, we didn’t even get to do appearances after the Olympics because of COVID. Going to Paris is going to be normal and it makes me sad. I wouldn’t change anything and I’m so glad we got to have the Olympics (in 2021) but it does really make me sad that I won’t get that normal experience, to get to have my family cheering for me in the stands.”
Skinner noted that she may make her way back to the sport — via broadcasting, definitely not by way of becoming a judge. Coaching isn’t on her radar either, but if it ever does enter her mind, she wants to be a college gymnastics coach.
Still, today Skinner is content with her gymnastics career, and she looks forward to living vicariously through Charlotte and any future kids she and Jonas might have.
“After everything with my comeback, I’m very grateful with how it turned out,” she said. “It was such a ride, a dream come true. I would love to be out there one more time just to feel the support and being able to represent Team USA. I’m really glad I got to live out my dream and now watch others do the same.
“… When I’m watching gymnastics right now it makes me want to do it (make a comeback), but having that stress and that pressure, I don’t want to do that again. I love competing, but the practices every day. It would be a lot. I think I could do it, but realistically I don’t think it is the picture for me. Hopefully I get to watch Charlotte and my kids do sports and love something like I did. There is more to come through my kid, but I am done.”
