Three not to be for MacLennan

Double gold medallist, slowed by ankle, has to settle for fourth place

TOKYO—The wraithlike Japanese girl sobbed and sobbed and sobbed. At every spot where she stopped along mixed zone alley — which is kind of like running the bulls in Pamplona, except journalists are the snorting toros — there was a fresh outburst of tears from the reigning trampoline world champion.

As there had been from distraught competitors throughout the event: Crumpled faces, cheeks wet with weeping, tremulous smiles for judges at the end of a botched routine, eyes cast miserably towards the scoreboard.

Half a dozen females crashed out of the event in the qualifying stage and medal round Friday afternoon, tumbling onto the tubing, collapsing into the jumping mat, bouncing off the safety pads, which aren’t that soft, all splayed limbs and contorted crouches.

An observer thinks: This is so much harder than it looks.

Rosie MacLennan didn’t cry. Been in the game too long for that. But clearly downcast and knowing in her bones when her score flashed that 55.595 for the routine that counted, would not be enough with three strong rivals still to come, to reach the podium.

She would not defend her back-to-back Olympic gold, from Rio and London, thereby becoming the only Canadian Olympian, in any sport, with three consecutive triumphs at the Games.

“Obviously not quite what I was hoping for,’’ said the 32year-old from King City who, in Rio, became the only athlete to successfully defend an Olympic trampoline title. “I was really hoping to have the opportunity to stand on the podium for Canada again.’’

She finished fourth, that most cruel of outcomes.

A pair of gold medals in her trophy case already will take some of the sting out of it. And the highly decorated MacLennan, who was the flag-bearer for Canada at the opening ceremonies five years ago, took considerable comfort from just being able to be here, part of the uber-elite field, pushing her body back into competitive shape after completely tearing multiple ankle ligaments, partially tearing another, and suffering deep bone bruises from a bad landing while training exactly nine weeks earlier.

“It was a big question mark,

whether I’d get back in time. It was two days before I left (Canada) that I was able to put routines together for the first time. Given the circumstances, I was able to do something and make the final. If you had told me that six weeks ago, I would have been stoked. It’s bittersweet at the moment.’’

She didn’t have to do this. There was nothing left to prove for the trampoline virtuoso. Except for the competitive boil in her blood, the lure of an Olympic three-peat, and the genuine desire to medal again for her country.

Her predicament led MacLennan and long-time coach Dave Ross to decide she wouldn’t attempt three forward somersaults in a single routine, though she’d wanted desperately to become the first woman to do so in competition. And still she came within a whisper of bronze.

“The routine was very close to what she can do,’’ said Ross. “She could have come second with a great routine. If she hadn’t been injured, she could have maybe come first.’’

Xueying Zhu (56.635) and Lingling Liu (56.350) pulled off a one-two China finish, with Britain’s Bryony Page (55.735)

slipping past MacLennan for bronze. Japan’s Hikaru Mori, world champion, didn’t even make the final eight cut, hence the bawling. Toronto’s Samantha Smith, 29, didn’t advance out of qualifying either.

Injuries are a fact of life for athletes. Three weeks before Rio, she’d suffered a concussion that left her light-headed and dizzy. But she persevered then as she did here. Yet MacLennan empathized with Simone Biles, the American gymnastic phenomenon — six-time Olympic medallist — who withdrew from Tuesday’s team final and all of Thursday’s all-around finals following a vault that went haywire, Biles explaining that she’d felt “lost in the air,’’ mentally and physically out of sync — the disconnect stutter step between mind and body that gymnasts call “twisties.’’

“There are mental pieces to all sports but in aerial sports, where you’re flipping and twisting, there’s a huge mental component,’’ MacLennan explained. “When you get lost in the air, it’s one of the most terrifying experiences you can have. And it’s not easy to get through. I think it was incredibly courageous of (Biles) to be able to acknowledge that she was not in the right state of mind to be able to do what she’s capable of.’’

Biles received tremendous support from teammates, from the media, from the public, for disclosing her mental vulnerability.

“She had a tweet that she only now realizes that she was valued for more than her accomplishments in gymnastics,’’ MacLennan continued. “I’m sorry it took this for her to realize that.’’

Trampolinists are gymnasts, their only apparatus a rectangular “bed’’ made from a woven synthetic fabric attached to a steel frame with springs that propel performers high — and we do mean high — into the air. MacLennan admitted she’s felt fear in the air, particularly when confidence has been shaken, venturing back onto the trampoline from injury, crediting Ross for navigating her through it with patience.

“He helped me break down all the skills and piece them back together again bit by bit. The fear that you experience though, it sticks with you. You second-guess yourself sometimes.’’

MacLennan committed some errors in her routine, travelled too far from the bull’s-eye on the mat in the bounce, though managing to correct her positioning. The technical points lost were costly. As Ross put it: “Boom there it goes.’’

Before her routines, MacLennan always shuts her eyes, takes deep breaths and disappears into the Zen of her sport. Thinking: “One, I know that I’m loved. I know that I’ve supported. And then I really try to focus on the opportunity and the love of my sport, and then the tangible thing to make the routine the best I can.’’

Love of the thing, the sheer exhilaration of flying. “We get to project ourselves really high in the air and flip around and it’s a pretty incredible feeling.’’

These are MacLennan’s fourth Games. On Saturday, she will be flying home, eagerly looking forward to seeing her husband, parents, siblings, some family members she hasn’t seen in nearly two years because of the pandemic.

She could have gone out on top, a double gold medallist, enshrined. But no regrets.

“Absolutely not. I love this sport. At the end of the day, my experience in sport, there’s so much depth to it, so much that I’ve learned in sport that I can take with me for the rest of my life. I wouldn’t trade a second of it.’’