USAG has announced the field for the American Cup which will take place on March the 2nd in Greensboro, NC. This will be the first all-around World Cup of the 2019 series. However, this year the all-around World Cups do not serve as Olympic qualifiers yet and many countries opted to decline their invitation. The absence of Russian gymnasts was to be expected, they haven’t attended American Cup since 2011 and the competition coincides with the Russian Championships this year. Oleg Verniaiev, usually a staple at these competitions, is likely taking some more time to heal from his should injury and Petro Pakhniuk will represent Ukraine in his place. Interestingly, Italy, Brazil and Great Britain which normally send WAG gymnasts there also declined their invitations. On the WAG side, there were so many declined invitations that South Korea who took the 14th place at the 2018 Worlds got an invite.
USAG often sends a well-known senior gymnast to headline the competition to attract spectators. In the past, they normally announced one competitor both for WAG and MAG in advance while the second spot (which they get as the host nation) was decided closer to the event. This year, both spots were announced at once and for WAG, the 2018 Worlds team member Grace McCallum and the 2018 junior national champion Leanne Wong got the spots. According to Will Graves of AP, Tom Forster, the national team coordinator, offered the opportunity to compete at the American Cup to Simone Biles, Morgan Hurd, and Riley McCusker but all three said they preferred to take it slow at the beginning of the season and work on some upgrades. US women have dominated this event for years but this year, their streak might finally be broken by the current silver AA World medalist Mai Murakami.
The full list of competitors:
Women
Canada: Ellie Black
China: Lu Yufei
France: Celia Serber
Germany: Kim Bui
Japan: Mai Murakami
Korea: to be announced
Netherlands: Sanna Veerman
USA: Leanne Wong
USA: Grace Mc Callum
Men
China: Ma Yue
Great Britain: James Hall
Germany: Marcel Nguyen
Japan: Kenzo Shirai
Netherlands: Bart Deurloo
Switzerland: Christian Baumann
Ukraine: Petro Pakhniuk
USA: Samuel Mikulak
USA: Yul Moldauer
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