By Gil LeBreton
glebreton@star-telegram.com
LONDON -- The new queen of Olympic gymnastics is a human run-on sentence, caroming without punctuation into an indelible smile.
If there is a window into what has vaulted Gabrielle "Gabby" Douglas to the top of the gymnastics world, it is probably behind those glistening teeth and that infectious smile.
In the weeks leading up to these Olympic Games, the dispatches all talked about her boundless energy. But truth be told, the powers that be were worried about her focus.
Douglas, after all, who won the women's all-around gold medal Thursday, is but 16, barely old enough to drive in a life that just veered into the fast lane.
From here, it's going to be a blur of Wheaties boxes and Matt Lauer interviews, of red carpets and Rolex ads.
It's going to be a stunning transformation for the sleek, young gymnast that Martha Karolyi once nicknamed, "The Flying Squirrel."
"She showed such great improvement, it's been incredible to see in such a short time," said Karolyi, the coordinator for the U.S. women's team.
"I have never seen a gymnast that was average, but good, five months ago climb so fast to be the best in the world."
In the Olympics, timing is everything. Timing is being healthy and healed and 16 and climbing, all on the same night.
The three experienced U.S. women who wanted to be here all learned that the hard way. Nastia Liukin, Shawn Johnson and Alicia Sacramone, all veterans of the 2008 U.S. Olympic team, were thwarted at the trials this time by either injuries or self-imposed layoffs.
Miss one day in the practice gym, the saying goes, and you'll be beaten by a stranger who didn't.
For Gabby Douglas, timing was everything.
She began Thursday's all-around finals with a dazzling 15.966 in vaulting. She followed that with a 15.733 score on the uneven bars, and left the rest of the gold medal contenders on a Flying Squirrel chase.
Whether Douglas makes an indelible mark with her newfound Olympic gymnastics fame remains to be seen. Liukin and Mary Lou Retton, both Olympic all-around winners, had the poise and personalities to pull it off.
Douglas abounds in personality. But she can also come across as remarkably glib for a 16-year-old.
Youthful innocence can be endearing. A precocious teenager, not so much.
But Douglas will be the one to determine that.
In the meantime, controversy again shadowed the gymnastics competition's outcome.
Reigning world champion Jordyn Wieber was denied a third spot for the United States in the all-around field because of an arbitrary rule that limits each country to two competitors.
But the gymnast who had a career day in the qualifying round, 18-year-old Aly Raisman, learned the cruel way that the rules giveth, but they can also taketh away.
Though Raisman's score Thursday was tied for the third highest, she lost out on a medal by a tiebreaker.
Raisman seemed to be handling the ruling a lot better than the adults around her were doing.
Her coach, Mihai Brestyan, felt that the controversy that bumped Wieber from the all-around finals had taken a subtle toll on Raisman's concentration.
"Everybody makes you feel bad because you took the world champion's place," Brestyan said.
Behind Douglas on the medals platform were Russia's Victoria Komova and Aliya Mustafina.
Wieber likely could have beaten them both -- and has over the past 12 months.
But this was Douglas' Olympics, not hers. And not, as it turned out, Raisman's.
If Douglas had a signature moment in the finals, it came on the balance beam. Her brief wobbles were swiftly corrected with instant determination. Her golden confidence was evident.
For the third Olympics in a row, the best women's gymnast in the world is an American teenager.
Watch her smile. Hear the energy in her talk.
This has been Gabby Douglas' summer, her Olympics.
Timing is everything.
Gil LeBreton, 817-390-7697Twitter: @gilebreton
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