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It deserves it's own because this was crazy and entertaining.
I didn't know this happened, I was just poring over some news sites which I do a few times a day and saw a feature and clicked on it to see what it was all about.
Alrighty then, a few things. This was a hoot to watch. And look at her face as she starts the final tumble or whatever it's called. She was not playing around. Playtime was over!
And all the people that were giving her shit about being "too big" should be spayed and neutered. There isn't anything wrong with her in regards to her size/weight.
From USA Today..........
We’ve all seen it by now — the viral, two-minute video of UCLA gymnast Katelyn Ohashi's captivating floor routine.
Her unbridled joy, combined with her acrobatic flips, splits and dance moves and a legendary lineup of songs, resulted in a perfect 10 from the judges, as well as 38 million video views on UCLA Gymnastics' tweet and more than 858,000 retweets and favorites as of Wednesday morning.
Put simply: This wasn't your typical floor routine. But for more reasons than the obvious.
Rewind a few years, when the now 21-year-old senior — an Olympic hopeful who was on top of the gymnastics world, having beaten eventual four-time Olympic gold medalist Simone Biles at the 2013 American Cup — decided to retire from elite-level gymnastics after serious injuries and years of physical and mental burnout reached a boiling point.
The Players' Tribune last August, noting that the pressure — specifically when it came to her body and what she ate — from fans and coaches left her "broken."
"I was happy to be injured," she said. "I was told that it was embarrassing how big I'd become. I was compared to a bird that couldn't fly. These are all things that I heard before I even got injured, things that, when I was skinny I was told. So what would they think of me when I had become big? I couldn't accept myself. Gymnastics was my worth, it was my life. I hated myself."
Now gymnastics is just a part of her life.
Speaking to USA TODAY Sports on Tuesday, Ohashi credited UCLA — and, more importantly, its culture — for giving her a new lease on life.
"Coming to UCLA, having been blessed to have the coaches I have that don't encourage us to just be athletes, (but be) human beings instead, has really helped me to (become) who I am today," she said. "Also, having my team to support me throughout that, which is a privilege. I felt like I was dancing with them on the floor and having as much fun as possible. That's all been a huge, huge part of my joy."
And that joy has broken the internet — more than once.
This isn't Ohashi's first time reaching online superstardom. Her routine at the 2018 Pac-12 Championships, which featured a Michael Jackson medley, accrued more than 90 million views, according to UCLA Gymnastics.
Going viral once is no easy task, but twice? Ohashi has cracked the code, and she's having a blast doing it.
"At the end of the day, I just go out there and do my best and have as much fun as I can," she said. "You never know how anyone's going to respond. So seeing not only that people have responded, but the types of people that have responded, is crazy."
Those people include Sen. Kamala Harris, Rev. Jesse Jackson, Ryan Seacrest and Troy Aikman.
In other words, Ohashi is a big deal. And not just on the mat.
Follow USA TODAY Sports' AJ Neuharth-Keusch on Twitter @tweetAJNK
I didn't know this happened, I was just poring over some news sites which I do a few times a day and saw a feature and clicked on it to see what it was all about.
Alrighty then, a few things. This was a hoot to watch. And look at her face as she starts the final tumble or whatever it's called. She was not playing around. Playtime was over!
And all the people that were giving her shit about being "too big" should be spayed and neutered. There isn't anything wrong with her in regards to her size/weight.
From USA Today..........
We’ve all seen it by now — the viral, two-minute video of UCLA gymnast Katelyn Ohashi's captivating floor routine.
Her unbridled joy, combined with her acrobatic flips, splits and dance moves and a legendary lineup of songs, resulted in a perfect 10 from the judges, as well as 38 million video views on UCLA Gymnastics' tweet and more than 858,000 retweets and favorites as of Wednesday morning.
Put simply: This wasn't your typical floor routine. But for more reasons than the obvious.
Rewind a few years, when the now 21-year-old senior — an Olympic hopeful who was on top of the gymnastics world, having beaten eventual four-time Olympic gold medalist Simone Biles at the 2013 American Cup — decided to retire from elite-level gymnastics after serious injuries and years of physical and mental burnout reached a boiling point.
The Players' Tribune last August, noting that the pressure — specifically when it came to her body and what she ate — from fans and coaches left her "broken."
"I was happy to be injured," she said. "I was told that it was embarrassing how big I'd become. I was compared to a bird that couldn't fly. These are all things that I heard before I even got injured, things that, when I was skinny I was told. So what would they think of me when I had become big? I couldn't accept myself. Gymnastics was my worth, it was my life. I hated myself."
Now gymnastics is just a part of her life.
Speaking to USA TODAY Sports on Tuesday, Ohashi credited UCLA — and, more importantly, its culture — for giving her a new lease on life.
"Coming to UCLA, having been blessed to have the coaches I have that don't encourage us to just be athletes, (but be) human beings instead, has really helped me to (become) who I am today," she said. "Also, having my team to support me throughout that, which is a privilege. I felt like I was dancing with them on the floor and having as much fun as possible. That's all been a huge, huge part of my joy."
And that joy has broken the internet — more than once.
This isn't Ohashi's first time reaching online superstardom. Her routine at the 2018 Pac-12 Championships, which featured a Michael Jackson medley, accrued more than 90 million views, according to UCLA Gymnastics.
Going viral once is no easy task, but twice? Ohashi has cracked the code, and she's having a blast doing it.
"At the end of the day, I just go out there and do my best and have as much fun as I can," she said. "You never know how anyone's going to respond. So seeing not only that people have responded, but the types of people that have responded, is crazy."
Those people include Sen. Kamala Harris, Rev. Jesse Jackson, Ryan Seacrest and Troy Aikman.
In other words, Ohashi is a big deal. And not just on the mat.
Follow USA TODAY Sports' AJ Neuharth-Keusch on Twitter @tweetAJNK
