Alicia Sacramone

Alicia Marie Sacramone (born December 3, 1987) is a retired American artistic gymnast. A member of the U.S. National Team, she is the 2005 World Champion on floor exercise, the 2008 U.S. National Champion on vault, and a seven-time medalist at the World Artistic Gymnastics Championships. At the 2008 Beijing Olympics, she won a silver medal competing for the USA in the artistic gymnastics team all-around competition.

Sacramone began gymnastics at the age of eight, began competing in the elite ranks in 2002 and joined the U.S. national team in 2003. Since 2005 she has been a key member of the U.S. team, and has won two World Championship titles and seven World Championships medals in total. Shannon Miller and Nastia Liukin are the only American gymnasts to hold more World Championships medals than Sacramone; 1970s gymnast Kurt Thomas also has seven. Sacramone has also become known as the "spiritual and social leader" of the U.S. gymnastics team, frequently rallying and supporting her teammates and offering advice in stressful situations.

Sacramone was born on December 3, 1987 in Boston, Massachusetts to parents Fred, an orthodontist, and Gail Sacramone. She is of Italian descent. Sacramone has an older brother, Jonathan, who is 5 1/2 years her senior.

Sacramone began studying dance at the age of three and started training gymnastics five years later, at age eight, in 1996. She began her gymnastics career with Romanian coaches Mihai and Silvia Brestyan at Gymnastics and More club and continued to train with them after they opened their own training facility in Ashland. The Brestyans continued to serve as Sacramone's coaches until her retirement in 2008.

Sacramone entered the elite ranks in 2002, placing seventh in the all-around and sixth on the vault in the junior division at that year's U.S. Classic competition. At the 2002 U.S. National Championships, she placed 22nd, but achieved a seventh place finish on the balance beam. Her results improved immensely the next year, when she placed 14th in the all-around and won a bronze medal on the vault at the 2003 U.S. Nationals, earning a spot on the U.S. National gymnastics team. Sacramone also participated in her first international competition in 2003, the Massilia Cup in France, where she placed fourth on the floor exercise and ninth on vault.

2008 Summer Olympics

At the Olympics, Sacramone performed on three events in both the qualifying and team final rounds of competition. In the team final, Sacramone posted a 15.675 score on vault but fell on both floor and beam, incurring 1.70 points in deductions.

In the day following the Olympic team finals, Sacramone was largely blamed for the American team's silver medal placement, and was the subject of negative commentary in media reports. Sacramone herself took responsibility for the results, noting, "It's kinda hard not to blame myself." However, analysts in the gymnastics community, including University of Georgia head coach Suzanne Yoculan, former Olympian John Roethlisberger and International Gymnast editor Paul Ziert, noted that the American team started the competition at a difficult point deficit to the Chinese and that mathematically, Sacramone could not have been personally or exclusively responsible for the U.S. team's results. Sacramone also received support from the American team. In one interview, teammate Bridget Sloan stated, "We've all made mistakes. It's just really hard to see her go and leave these Olympics knowing that she thinks it's her fault. It is definitely not and we've all been encouraging her very much."

Individually, Sacramone placed third overall on vault in the preliminary round of competition and qualified to the individual event final on that event. In the vault final, Sacramone placed fourth, just out of the medals. She also placed fourth overall on beam in preliminaries behind Li Shanshan of China and teammates Nastia Liukin and Shawn Johnson, but did not advance to the event finals due to the "two per country" rule.

In June 2008, Sacramone and her teammates Shawn Johnson and Nastia Liukin became the first female athletes ever to be signed as CoverGirl spokesmodels. Sacramone is also a member of Team 24 Fitness and serves as a spokeswoman for the fitness company. In 2009, she also appeared in a Gatorade commercial that spoofed Monty Python and the Holy Grail as "Alicia, The Girl Who Made Horse Trotting Noises."