Julissa Gomez

Gomez was born in San Antonio, Texas, the older of two daughters born to a pair of former migrant farm workers from Laredo, Texas. Her parents, mother Otilia and father Ramiro, worked their way up from their farm working days to become a teacher and a welder, respectively, and struggled to keep their family together while giving 10-year-old budding gymnast Julissa a chance to train with renowned gymnastics coach Béla Károlyi in Houston. At the 1986 U.S. Championships, she placed fourth in the all-around in the junior division and won a place on the U.S. National Team. By 1987, she was representing the United States in international meets. Especially strong on the uneven bars and balance beam, Gomez was considered a legitimate contender for the 1988 U.S. Olympic team. In mid-1987, Gomez wanted to move further up the rankings and reportedly became frustrated with Károlyi's sometimes abusive training methods. Gomez's search for a new coach led her to select Al Fong, who was the trainer of another up-and-coming gymnast eager to make the 1988 Olympic team, Christy Henrich. Though her parents had vowed to keep the family together no matter where Julissa's career took her, they decided that Ramiro would move with Julissa to Blue Springs, Missouri, where Fong's gymnastics club, Great American Gymnastics Express (GAGE), was located while Otilia would remain behind until Julissa's younger sister Kristy finished school for the year. ==Injury and death==

In May 1988, several months before the Olympics, Gomez traveled with her coach to Tokyo, Japan, to compete in the World Sports Fair. During the all-around competition, Gomez qualified for the vault finals. However, observers had noticed her struggle with the apparatus over the months leading up to the competition, including her former coach Béla Károlyi, past and present teammates, and even her present coach Al Fong. Gomez' technique on the extremely difficult Yurchenko vault had been described as shaky at best, and Gomez was unable to perform the vault with any consistency during practices, sometimes missing her feet on the springboard. During warmups for the final, held on May 5, 1988, Gomez continued to practice the Yurchenko. As she raced toward the vault on one of her practice runs, her foot slipped off the springboard and she slammed headfirst into the vaulting horse at high speed. The resulting impact paralyzed her from the neck down. A subsequent accident at a Japanese hospital, in which she became disconnected from her ventilator, Gomez's family cared for her for three years before she succumbed to an infection and died in August 1991 in Houston. ==Aftermath==

Gomez's accident stands as one of the most serious to occur in artistic gymnastics, and helped prompt changes in the sport. In 1989, the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG) decided to increase vaulting safety by allowing U-shaped springboard mats to be used during competitions, which gave the gymnasts a greater margin of error in preflight and were only allowed during practice until that point. In 2001, the traditional vaulting horse was completely phased out and replaced by a larger, more stable vaulting table to provide gymnasts with additional safety. ==See also==