Shannon Miller fell off the balance beam in her first routine Friday, but recovered with nearly flawless performances in the other three optional events to capture the National Gymnastics Championship.
Miller, a five-time medalist at the 1992 Olympics and the 1993 national champion, was in first place after Wednesday's compulsories. But she scored a 9.3 on the beam and fell into third place behind Jaycie Phelps and Dominique Moceanu.She came back with a 9.8 on the vault, a 9.85 on the uneven bars and a 9.9 on the floor exercises to edge Phelps by five-hundredths of a point over the two-day competition.
"I've had competitions before where I've had to come back. The fall woke me up and got me going for the next three events," she said.
The top 14 finishers will go to Boston later this month for the Olympic trials. Following Moceanu were Amanda Borden and Kerri Strug.
Dominique Dawes finished sixth, followed by Kristy Powell, Jennie Thompson, Mary Beth Arnold and Katie Teft in tenth.
Theresa Kulikowski was 11th, Mohini Bhardwaj and Larissa Fontaine tied for 12th, and Kristen Maloney finished 14th to qualify for the trials.
Monica Flammer in 15th and Alecian Ingram in 16th also made the U.S. national team.
Beach volleyball
BALTIMORE - Mike Dodd and Mike Whitmarsh delivered the most stunning upset so far at the Olympic Beach Volleyball Trials, beating No. 1 seeds Karch Kiraly and Kent Steffes 15-8 Friday.
Kiraly, who won two gold medals for indoor volleyball, and Steffes must advance through the losers' bracket to obtain one of the two remaining men's berths in this summer's Olympic Games.
On the women's side, Barbra Fontana Harris and Linda Hanley won both their matches Friday to clinch their Olympic berth.
Leading 8-7 in the middle of the match at the Harborview Complex in Baltimore, Dodd and Whitmarsh ripped off five straight points and seven of eight to advance to Saturday's Olympic qualification match against Randy Stoklos and Adam Johnson.
Sinjin Smith and Carl Henkel have already qualified for the Olympics based on the results from last year's men's international tour, as have Holly McPeak and Nancy Reno for the women.
Wrestling
SPOKANE, Wash. - Terry Brands and Kevin Jackson earned spots in today's finals during the U.S. Olympic freestyle wrestling trials Friday at the Spokane Arena.
Eric Akin pulled off an upset win at 1141/2 pounds, while Pat Santoro, Pat Smith, Mike Van Arsdale, Kanamti Solomon, Dan Chaid and Tom Erikson also posted wins to advance.
Ten weight-class winners during Friday's elimination tournament will wrestle the No. 1 seeds on Saturday. The No. 1 seeds, winners of the recent national championships, had byes.
Winners of the best-of-3 matches on Saturday will comprise the freestyle wrestling team at the Atlanta Olympics.
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ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
Graham moves up
Tooele's Deidre Graham, who trains at Sandy's Olympus School of Gymnastics, moved up from 23rd place after compulsories to finish 21st overall Friday night with two day scores of 42.90 - 28.14 - 71.04. Graham has been a national team member.