Gabby Douglas

Country: USA
Sport: Gymnastics
Date of Birth: 12/31/1995
First Olympics: 2012, London

Gabby Douglas became the star of the 2012 Olympic women's gymnastics team when she won all-around gold at 16 years old.

Douglas, of Newport News, Virginia, was the first U.S. gymnast to win gold in both the Olympic all-around and team competitions. She says her goal is to repeat as all-around Olympic champion, but after leaving former coach Liang Chow and struggling to find a stable training situation, many doubted if another Olympics was possible for Douglas.

She quickly proved her critics wrong when she returned to competition in 2015. After placing in the top five all-around in her first three meets after her return, Douglas claimed an all-around silver medal at the 2015 World Championships in addition to a gold medal in the team final. She was the first reigning women's all-around Olympic champion to win an all-around world championship medal since the Soviet Union's Yelena Davydova in 1981.

At the Olympic Team Trials in San Jose this summer, she placed third in uneven bars and sixth in vault. In Rio, she will compete in her two favorite events, floor exercise and balance beam, and will also try for gold in vault and uneven bars.

Post-London Olympics, her publicity rounds included being featured on boxes of Corn Flakes cereal, releasing a book titled "Grace, Gold and Glory: My Leap of Faith" and inspiring a Lifetime movie titled "The Gabby Douglas Story."

Copyright Rio2016
Contact Us