Jennifer Sey, the 1986 U.S. National Gymnastics Champion, argues in her new memoir Chalked Up that gymnastics is a contact sport:
“In football, it’s another player who crushes, bruises, breaks the athlete. In gymnastics, it’s the floor. Or the beam. Or any piece of unmoving, unforgiving equipment that meets the body on its descent through the air from great heights.”
From Chalked Up: Inside Elite Gymnastics’ Merciless Coaching, Overzealous Parents, Eating Disorders, and Elusive Olympic Dreams (Morrow, 289 pp., $24.95). For more on the book, see Sey’s site www.jennifersey.com and this review www.oneminutebookreviews.wordpress.com/2008/06/02. Read an excerpt from Chalked Up here www.jensey.com/excerpt.htm.
[During the Olympics, One-Minute Book Reviews post, in addition to reviews, frequent quotes about marquee events in Beijing. These quotes will generally come from good books about sports. Another comment about women's gymnastics will appear later today.]
© 2008 Janice Harayda. All rights reserved.
www.janiceharayda.com
Will the author let me know when football promotes anorexia, mmkay?
Comment by Amelia — August 12, 2008 @ 9:38 am |