Legends like Mary Lou Retton come along once in a lifetime.
“Her other attribute is that she’s one heckuva competitor.
As the competition gets greater, she gets greater.”
Here’s an in-depth look at the stunning transformation of Mary Lou Retton.
Little distracted Retton from her strict school-to-gym regimen.
Training for the Olympics eventually prompted her to drop out of high school and continue her education through correspondence.
We’d call her Miss Grace," Retton’s mother told Sports Illustrated.
Still, Retton took the commentary in stride.
“Well, I’ve always been different,” she explained.
“I don’t conform and here I am.
I’m proud of that fact, that those walls have come down.”
The intensity with which young Retton trained naturally yielded challenges that involved injuries and surgeries.
In 1983, a fractured wrist cost the teen prodigy a shot at the world championships.
Meanwhile, perennially creaking bones made her mother afraid she’d suffer from early-onset arthritis.
“She was busting up her ribs on the uneven bars,” her mom told the magazine.
Ultimately, rheumatic troubles would prompt Retton to have hip replacement surgery later in life.
Amid much distress, especially on the part of her coach Bela Karolyi, Retton underwent the operation.
Her medical procedure was kept under wraps, as she resumed training despite her condition.
“We did three months of rehabilitation in two weeks,” she told theLos Angeles Times.
“I mean, to get back into that kind of shape that fast is just unheard of.”
The pro gymnast was also overtaken by a sense of self-assuredness in the middle of her vault routine.
“I could always tell if I’m going to get the landing or not, and I knew.
“I slept with my medal under my bed that night.
Back in 1984, she was the success story America couldn’t get enough of.
But for her it was the natural joy of being in that sport.
She was crying, she was laughing, she was a joy.”
At just 16, Retton’s athletic arsenal was loaded with gymnastic maneuvers exclusive to her expertise.
Her mastery over the elite Tsukahara vault, for instance, was further accentuated with an extra twist mid-air.
The Retton Salto was another trick that belonged to the teen.
Everybody else seems to be standing still” (viaThe New York Times).
Retton’s success story as an Olympic-level gymnast was only superseded by her meteoric rise as a media darling.
“Gymnastics was my life for 11 years …
But I achieved the goals I wanted at an early age.
Now I have the rest of my life to do what I want,“UPIquoted her as saying.
Switching over to the schedules of a regular teen wasn’t a seamless process for Retton initially.
Retton welcomed four daughters with her ex-husband
Mary Lou Retton always knew she wanted a big brood.
Nearly three decades of marriage came to an end for Retton in 2018 when she and Kelley divorced.
“My whole life was based on my physicality what I could physically do.
And that went away with arthritis,” she toldWoman’s World.
Retton was born with hip dysplasia, a fact unbeknownst to her for a significant part of her life.
“The most important thing is that the pain is now gone,” she told the outlet.
But as she herself acknowledged soon after retiring, her association with gymnastics wouldn’t end so readily.
She was, after all, a pioneering American sportswoman.
“People come up to me and say that I’m still a role model with the young ones.
Which is a big responsibility,” she toldThe Washington Post.
She was eliminated in the sixth week of the show, though she had welcomed the physical challenge.
“She is not able to breathe on her own.
She’s been in the ICU for over a week now,” the statement read.
