Armour: Laurie Hernandez keeps pace with vets at U.S. gymnastics championships

ST. LOUIS — Shimmying and shaking, Laurie Hernandez flashed a smile so bright it looked like a flashbulb going off. The crowd, already clapping to her lively music, roared its approval.

Yep, it’s official. The Americans are going to need a bigger spotlight.

Hernandez, who just turned 16 on June 9, showed she’s going to fit in just fine with three-time world champion Simone Biles and Fierce Fivers Gabby Douglas and Aly Raisman. A year after winning the junior title, Hernandez took a big step toward making her first Olympic team Friday night, tying Raisman for second at the U.S. gymnastics championships.

“She didn’t feel intimidated and she did what she was prepared for,” said Martha Karolyi, the national team coordinator. “That’s exactly what you look for, to see if she can handle the pressure and if she feels comfortable with that setting. Today, she proved she can do it.

“She is a legitimate contender.”

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Hernandez still has to get through Sunday’s finals and the Olympics trials July 8-10 in San Jose, of course. And given that only the all-around winner at trials — cough, Biles, cough — automatically qualifies for the five-woman Rio team, her fate will be in the hands of the selection committee.

But if she keeps performing as she did Friday, she’ll be on her way to Rio.

“I’m still not thinking about it, which I know sounds kind of funny from someone who’s trying to get to the Olympics,” Hernandez said. “If you think too far ahead, then it’ll just stress you out. So you need to focus on the now and I think I’ve done just that and it’s working perfectly.”

The expectations for Hernandez have been high since she took the junior title last year with a score that would have put her in the running for the world championships team if only she’d been old enough to compete. Her difficulty on balance beam and uneven bars ranks up there with the best in the world, and her floor exercise will too, once she gets back up to full speed.

Oh, yeah. The performance Hernandez put on Friday? It came less than a month after she returned to training after missing more than six weeks with a knee injury.

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Two weeks ago, she could only manage a dance-through of her floor exercise.

“I’m a little overly excited with the way she competed,” said her longtime coach, Maggie Haney. “I can’t say I definitely saw this coming after the last couple of weeks we’ve had.”

But make no mistake, this was the plan all along.

Biles could skip Sunday’s final and Olympic trials and still be the first name on the Rio roster. She’s so far and away better than anyone else in the world that the joke is she needs her own division. Not really a joke, by the way, given that she hasn’t lost an all-around competition in three years.

Douglas, the reigning Olympic champion, and Raisman, the gold medalist on floor in London, are pretty solid bets for the team, too. That leaves two spots up for grabs — and history says one will go to a newcomer.

Fierce Fiver Kyla Ross was a first-year senior. Four years earlier, Bridget Sloan was the only member of the Beijing squad who hadn’t competed at a world championship. (She was an alternate in 2007.)

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Courtney McCool’s first major international event as a senior was the Athens Olympics. Tasha Schwikert was still 15 when she was a late add to the Sydney squad.

“Of course I’ve watched that,” Haney said. “Hopefully that will be my gymnast.”

Given the show she put on Friday, there’s no reason to think she won’t be.

With a score of 60.45, Hernandez and Raisman are 1.55 points ahead of Douglas. Hernandez also posted the third-highest scores on uneven bars, balance beam and tied for third on floor exercise.

Even more telling than the numbers, though, was the way Karolyi’s face lit up when she spoke about Hernandez.

“Her gymnastics is pretty precise,” Karolyi said. “Technically done well and also the artistry level is very good, as well.”

When Olympic medals are at stake, there’s no such thing as too much star power.