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The first day of competition will feature six of the eleven subdivisions for the women but all eyes will be on subdivision five which includes Simone Biles and team USA who are expected to dominate the competition here in Doha.  The US team has won the team and all-around titles at every World and Olympic games since 2010, when Aliya Mustafina and her Russian team won the titles. The three time all-around champion Biles is returning to her first international competition after a year off from gymnastics following the Rio Olympics. The 21 year old is expected to win titles here on vault, beam, floor and the all-around.  On vault Biles may debut a new vault, a round off handspring half on double twisting front layout off, which if she performs it successfully would be named after her.

Biles’ teammates Morgan Hurd, the defending all-around champion from a year ago, and Riley McCusker will also be competing in the all-around.  With only two competitiors per country one will have a great chance to join Biles as a medalist.  Other potential event finalists for the team could be: bars (McCusker, Biles or Hurd), beam (Hurd or Kara Eaker) and floor (Hurd or Grace McCallum) all depending on how they compete in their qualification round.

Others to watch:

Japan’s Mai Murakami, who just missed the podium in the all-around at last year’s worlds but won the floor title, is once again a legitimate contender for a medal on both events.  With a solid competition Japan could easily make the team final.

Germany is competing without last year’s beam medalists Pauline Schafer and Tabea Alt.  However the team has huge potential on bars (Kim Bui fourth at this year’s European championships, Elisabeth Seitz finalist at last year’s worlds and Sophie Scheder bronze medalist from the Rio Olympics).

Netherlands will rely on Olympic beam champion Sanne Wevers who looked really prepared on the event during the podium’s training. The team has potential for the team finals however a top 12 finish is more realistic.

Belgium’s Nina Derwael, bronze medalist on bars at last year's worlds, has prepared a 6.5 set and is the favorite for the title.  Derwael, who also has potential on beam, should easily qualify to the all-around final as well.

Diana Varinska from Ukraine was in the uneven bars and all-around finals last year in Montreal and could better that result here in Doha.

Seven times Olympian Oksana Chusovitina from Uzbekistan is aiming at the vault final once again.

Martha Pihan-Kulesza is still competing for Poland and as a mom she is still capable of producing competative beam and floor performances.

Georgia-Rose Brown is Australia’s best hope for an all-around final.

Lara Mori was a floor finalist at last year's worlds and that could be Italy's best chance for a final in Doha.

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CHINA

Defending all-around champion Xiao Ruoteng posted the highest qualifying score in the all-around 87.332 to edge the leader from day one Nikita Nagornyy (Russia) 87.098.  Ruoteng led the team to a total of 257.836, which is the second best qualifying score to Russia’s 258.402.  He posted strong marks on all of the event and earned event finals on pommel horse and high bar.  China was particularly impressive on p-bars and high bar. Defending p-bars champion Zou Jingyuan dazzled with his incredible amplitude for the tops score of 15.8, while teammate Lin Chaopan earned the third highest mark of qualification there - 15.266.  Joining Xiao in the high bar final will be Deng Shudi, but it could have been Lin had he not taken a very big step on his double twisting double layout.  The team’s only major issues happened on pommel horse where both Zou and Lin had falls.   Sun Wei and Lin also posted the fifth and seventh best all-around scores.

JAPAN

Kenzo Shirai had a strong day hitting every routine and posting the sixth top all-around score.  The defending floor and vault champion tied Dalaloyan’s top floor score at 14.833, and also qualified to the vault final.  Kohei Uchimura competed three events only.   He posted the top qualifying score on high bar 14.6, but fell on pommels on his Tong Fei.  Japan had three falls on pommels and posted third best team score, more than four points lower than second place China.

UNITED STATES

Sam Mikulak hit six really good routines for an impressive 86.598, for third best in qualifying just behind Xiao and Nagornyy.  Mikulak’ strong performances earned him four individual event finals, which along with Nagornyy, is the most of any gymnast here in Doha.   Mikulak qualified 8th on floor, 5th on pommels, 6th on p-bars and 2nd on high bar.  “This is kind of what I was hoping would happen going into this competition.  I didn’t want to put too much pressure, too much stress, really just go out and hit routines, 6/6 was my goal.”  Yul Moldauer had a somewhat of an off day with issues on his pommel horse and high bar routines but still managed to qualify to floor and all-around finals.  “Today is not about being the best, you just want to qualify to team finals.  So I think as a team we did pretty well.  We got our nerves out”, he reflected after the meet.  The team suffered three major errors on pommels and qualified in fourth place with a 250.362.

GREAT BRITAIN

Olympic Champion Max Whitlock leads pommel horse qualifying with his massive 6.7 difficulty routine, which is one of the only two individual event finals for the team.  Dominic Cunningham also qualified for the vault final.  James Hall and Brinn Bevan both qualified to all-around final placing 9th and 13th, respectively.  The British team also qualified to the team final posting the fifth best score.

NOTABLE INDIVIDUALS

Ring men Eleftherios Petrounias (Greece) and Arthur Zanetti (Brazil) qualified on the event first and second, respectively.

Armenian Artur Tovmasyan and Vahagn Davtyan qualified for the rings final.  Davtyan will also compete in the vault final where he posted the third best average.

Lee Chih Kai and Tang Chia-Hung from Chinese Taipei qualified for the pommel horse and high bar finals, respectively.

Ahmet Onder (Turkey) made the floor and all-around final.

Calvo Moreno (Colombia) qualified to p-bars final with the fourth highest score.

Cuba’s Manrique Larduet competed on three events only due to wrist and shoulder injuries.  Laduet fell on both p-bars and floor, and managed first reserve in the high bar final.

For full results, click here.

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