Reese Esponda Wins U.S. Classic! Ohashi Returns, Jade’s Upgrades & Skye Blakely Is BACK

We break down Reese Esponda’s all-around victory, Katelyn Ohashi’s return to elite gymnastics, Skye Blakely’s event titles, Jade Carey’s upgrades, breakout performances from Zoey Molomo and Isabella Anzola, and everything that stood out from the meet—including what the NBC broadcast missed. Join Club Gym Nerd for the full extended episode, live Q&A, bonus interviews, Behind the Scenes episodes every week, and exclusive coverage. JOIN THE CLUB https://gymcastic.com/club/ 📺 HOW TO WATCH THE 2026 U.S. CLASSIC 📅 Saturday, July 18 • Senior Women — 7:00 PM ET on Peacock/NBC ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ CHAPTERS 00:00 – Historic Moment in Gay Gymnastics History 01:13 – Reese Esponda Wins the U.S. Classic 01:31 – Jade Carey Takes the Long View 03:11 – Reese Esponda’s Bars, Beam and Winning Floor 05:41 – Katelyn Ohashi’s Successful Elite Return 06:23 – Ohashi’s Beam Inquiry and Qualification Score 08:45 – The Meet’s Real Winner: Smart Routine Construction 10:09 – Why Ohashi’s Comeback Is Already a Huge Success 13:07 – Could Ohashi Be Invited to Nationals? 14:33 – Dream Dance Elements for Ohashi 15:53 – Skye Blakely Wins Bars and Beam 16:42 – Ally Damelio’s Seitz 17:20 – Were the U.S. Classic Scores Too Generous? 18:02 – Jade Carey’s Lopez Around the Corner 18:21 – Classic Is Practice: Jade, Dulcy Caylor and Leanne Wong 19:12 – Leanne Wong’s Smarter Beam Composition 22:53 – BONUS FOR CLUB MEMBERS BEGINS To listen to the full episode login or join Club Gym Nerd for the extended Behind The Scenes episode every Friday: https://gymcastic.com/club/ 23:53 – Why Katelyn Ohashi and Laurie Hernandez + Jade Made Jessica Cry 26:48 – Breakout Stars: Zoey Molomo and Isabella Anzola 28:54 – Aki Tanda 31:16 – Reese Esponda’s Jump Double Turn Heard Around the World 31:26 – Skye Blakely’s Best Leotard of All Time 31:50 – Building a World Team From the U.S. Classic 33:31 – How to Watch Peacock and the International Feed Together 34:29 – Jade Carey’s Full-Twisting Double Layout Technique 35:41 – Simone Rose’s Coach Celebrates the Inbar Release 36:06 – Flip the Mascot’s International-Feed Lurking 36:50 – Do World Team Members Have to Be Top-Five All-Arounders? 37:10 – Should Jade Carey Increase Her Bars Difficulty? 39:22 – NCAA Coaches not on the podium 40:15 – Spencer’s Early World Team Prediction 42:02 – Charleigh Bullock’s Compelling Bars Score 42:28 – Izzy Stassi’s Elite Potential at Oklahoma 44:30 – Is the U.S. Currently a World-Gold Team? 45:32 – Tom Forster and the Selection Committee 45:54 – KJ Kindler’s Elite Debut 46:52 – Which Juniors Could Contend for Los Angeles 2028? 49:10 – Why USAG Needs a Single-Event Qualifying Score 51:02 – Suni Lee and the Case for Specialist Qualification 52:08 – The Olympic Champion Wild-Card Proposal 52:25 – Should Katelyn Ohashi Petition to Nationals? 54:38 – Could Ohashi Build a Competitive Elite Bars Routine? 58:11 – Commentary: Power Versus Poor Technique 58:26 – Laurie Hernandez, Honesty and Positive Commentary 59:17 – Samantha Peszek as the Commentary Training Wheels 1:00:35 – Gymnasts Still Planning Elite Comebacks 1:01:19 – How Many Paris-Quad Gymnasts Could Make the 2028 Team? 1:01:52 – Celebrity and Legacy Wild Cards 1:03:12 – Shilese Jones’ Comeback Status 1:03:30 – The Broadcast’s Skye Blakely Resilience Narrative 1:05:11 – Ohashi, Skye and Jade Mic’d Up 1:06:09 – Laurie Hernandez Roaming the Competition Floor 1:06:45 – Morgan Hurd and Zoey Miller Mic’d Up 1:08:48 – The Absurdity of Mandatory “Dry Seasons” 1:09:49 – What Does “No Partying” Actually Mean? 1:10:14 – Jessica Disappears to Dance in the Street 1:10:57 – Is LSU’s Injury Management a Problem? 1:11:37 – How Oklahoma Manages Injured Gymnasts 1:13:32 – Why Strength Training Cannot Be One-Size-Fits-All 1:14:32 – Why Gymnasts Translate So Well to Olympic Weightlifting ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ❤️ SUPPORT OUR WORK 💜 Club Gym Nerd https://gymcastic.com/club/ 🛍️ Shop GymCastic https://store.gymcastic.com/ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 🧰 GYMCASTIC TOOLS 🇺🇸 LA 2028 Roster Lab https://gymcastic.com/2028-roster-lab/ 📊 Elite Score Explorer https://gymcastic.com/elite-scores/ 📅 International Gymnastics Calendar https://gymcastic.com/gymnastics-cale... ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 📚 MORE GYMNASTICS RESOURCES 📖 The Balance Beam Situation https://balancebeamsituation.com/ 📜 Gymnastics History & Code of Points Archive https://www.gymnastics-history.com/ ✊ Resistance Resources https://gymcastic.com/resistance-reso... ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 👍 If you love gymnastics, subscribe, like, and turn on notifications so you never miss an episode from the Number One Gymnastics Podcast in the Galaxy.