by Diane Sussman
Like the basketball player who bounces the ball three times before each free throw, or the batter who touches home plate before each at-bat, gymnast Amy Chow has her own way of relieving anxiety and summoning Lady Luck. She tugs at the front of her leotard. Judges from Japan to Argentina repeatedly have called her coach's attention to it in hopes of breaking her of the habit. "It's annoying," admits Mark Young, Chow's coach and owner of West Valley Gymnastics in Cupertino where Chow trains. "But if she wants to pull, let her pull."
At this point, Young can afford to indulge Chow in a few pacifying rituals. The 17-year-old student at Castilleja School in Palo Alto may very well be on the United States Olympic gymnastics team next year.
Two years ago, Chow didn't look like an athlete destined for the Olympics. At the 1993 Coca Cola National Championships, she placed a lackluster 23rd all-around. But at last year's Senior National Team competition, she catapulted to fifth place. She now ranks sixth. With seven slots available, her place on the team seems relatively assured.
Chow has attracted considerably more attention since her stunning rise to sixth place. Internationally known gymnastics coach Bela Karolyi called her "one of the most promising girls leading up to the 1996 Olympics."
Larry Castle, a coach at West Valley Gymnastics, doesn't consider it farfetched to compare Chow to such gymnastic superstars as Mary Lou Retton and Olga Korbut. "It's not at all inappropriate," he said. "She's that good."
Chow is fast, fearless and strong. In a world full of small daredevils, Chow has distinguished herself by developing a cache of explosive, breathtaking tricks that no other female gymnast is doing. "They call her the Trickster," said Young. "She's gutsy, and she takes a lot of risks."
One such trick--a back Stalter with a 1 1/2 twist off the uneven parallel bars--is called, quite simply, "the Chow." "You don't get a trick named after you unless you're the only doing it, and she's the only one doing it," said Young. "It's a very risky thing. It's like the ice skater who's throwing the quadruple axel."
She is also working on what Young calls the "Chow 2," a front Stalter with a full twist in a mixed Dorsi grip. "This is another thing that is all hers," he said. Chow plans to show the trick at the next world competition round in April, or, Young says, "maybe at the Olympics."
She is more powerful than lyrical. If she has a weakness, it is her expressiveness as a dancer. "There is a lot of emphasis on her dance," said Castle. "It might just be the comparison between that and her other events. In everything else, she's awesome."
She's the antithesis of most Olympic-groomed gymnasts, who are trained to do "every skill perfectly but with absolutely no risk."
Of course, the greater the risk, the greater the potential for failure. "If she makes it, she's on top," said Young. "But the biggest risk is that she'll fall."
She's already taken one serious spill this year, and can't afford another. That one happened in September, two days before the World Games Competition in Sabae, Japan. While executing a dance turn at a clinic in Sacramento, she landed awkwardly on her left foot. She crumbled to the floor, stopped cold by the pain. "She was definitely down," said Young. "It was a serious sprain."
Serious enough to keep her out of the World Games. "We were all set to leave, but she couldn't even walk on it," said Young. "There was no way she could compete."
It wasn't her first injury, but it was the most catastrophic. All her other injuries, she claims, have been "minor": some heel problems, some pulled stomach muscles, a stress fracture, another sprained ankle.
But none of those accidents happened so close to the Olympic countdown.
Since then, Chow has been trying not to lose ground. She spends about eight hours a week at the More Physical Therapy Clinic in Santa Clara receiving ultrasound treatments and doing strengthening exercises. At night, at home in San Jose, she wraps her ankle and ices it.
She has hardly missed a practice. Indeed, within a half-hour of physical therapy, she is at the gym preparing for a five-hour session. "I always work out," she said. She spends about 30 to 33 hours a week training.
"She doesn't say it, but she's definitely unhappy when she can't work out," said her mother, Susan, who drives her from school to physical therapy to the gym. "She wants to go on with it."
She begins her workout with a series of stretches. Diane Amos, one of her coaches, stretches her out by pulling her arms back over her head until they practically touch the floor. She looks like doll with broken arm sockets. Onlookers wince; Chow smiles.
After stretching, she runs through the full sequence of activities: vaulting, uneven parallel bars, balance beam, floor dance, tumbling and stretch and conditioning. The whole sequence takes four to six hours.
If she has any doubts about her ability to compete, she's not voicing them. The most she says is that "it still hurts."
How much it hurts, or whether her self-confidence has been shaken, is not something she is sharing with anyone. "She never says anything about it to me," said Young. "She never complains. I know that her therapists have said they expect a complete recovery."
The reality is that if Chow doesn't go to the Olympics this year, she probably never will. By 2000, she will be 21, practically dowager status in gymnastics. Even if she remains at or near her present size--she is four feet, 11 inches tall and weighs 88 pounds--she would have a hard time competing against up-and-coming 15- and 17-year-olds. "I think she believes this is her only chance," said Young. "I think she's right."
Chow seems to be preparing for all possibilities. At the same time she's training like a prospective Olympian, she's studying as if she's on her way to Stanford medical school--which is exactly where she hopes to go.
Despite her grueling gymnastics schedule, her grades haven't slipped at all. She maintains a 4.08 average at Castilleja, for a course list in which the majority of classes begin with the words "honors" or "advanced placement." This quarter she is taking U.S. history, advanced placement biology, calculus and 20th-century literature.
She also plays piano--well. Last year, the same year she catapulted to fifth place in gymnastics, she won an advanced level certificate of merit in piano. When asked how she does it, she just shrugs. "I don't know. I just do it."
She does it by adhering to a schedule that would make many an executive look like a slacker. She is up at 7 a.m. and at school by 8 a.m. Four hours later, she is in the back seat of her mother's car, on her way to gymnastics. She eats lunch and changes in the car. At 7:30 p.m., she finishes gymnastics. Then it's home, piano practice and homework.
She has neither of the two primary hallmarks of a 17-year-old American girl: a driver's license or a boyfriend. "I don't want one," she said, not specifying whether she was referring to a boyfriend or a license. "I just don't have the time."
A great part of the logistics falls to her parents. Her father, Nelson, an engineering manager at Western Digital, drives her from San Jose to Palo Alto in the morning, while her mother drives her everywhere else. "I spend a few hours a day driving," said Susan. "And I make sure that she eats."
It's not easy, and it's not cheap. Susan Chow estimates the family spends $10,000 per year on training, travel and equipment.
From all the indicators, it has been money well spent. "She was destined for this," said Young. "She had everything we look for. By age 5, we knew she was special."
Chow came to gymnastics at age 3. She originally wanted to take ballet classes, but studios weren't interested in toddlers. "They told me to take her to gymnastics," said Susan.
Even at the simplest things--somersaults, jumping off a block, balancing on her toes--she was stronger, faster and more agile than the other girls.
And, she was small. Furthermore, she has small parents, a good indication that, even after puberty, she wouldn't outgrow the sylphlike dimensions associated with the sport.
Indeed, at the moment she has the ideal body for the sport. Chow is the same age and height that Olga Korbut was when she won the gold in the 1972 Olympics. Korbut was a tad slimmer: 85 pounds to Chow's 88. Although it wasn't uncommon then to have women competing in the Olympics who weighed 120 pounds, few Olympic gymnasts tip the scales above 100 these days. "There's no getting around it," said Castle, who arranges Chow's music. "In gymnastics, you want your athletes small. Think about it--all your weight is on your hands."
She's got the body, power and grit. At this point, Young's only concern is that her injury will disrupt her concentration. "We've been working 10 years on this," he said. "Her concentration is a gift. If she has that, she has everything."
At the physical therapy clinic, where pictures of Chow hang in the lobby, the staff is already preparing to say they knew her when. "Every time she comes here, we make her sign in," said Ron Kaminski, her physical therapist. "When she goes to the Olympics, we'll already have the autographs."
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