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236:, 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
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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 instantly paralyzed her
184:. 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
244:, later stated, "You could tell it was not a safe vault for her to be doing. Someone along the way should have stopped her." However, Julissa's coaches insisted that she needed to continue training and competing the Yurchenko vault in order to achieve high scores.
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In mid-1987, Gomez wanted to move further up the rankings and reportedly became frustrated with Károlyi's sometimes abusive training methods. She decided to then leave the Károlyis. After briefly training at US Acrosports in
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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. A teammate from Károlyi's,
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to be used during competitions, which give the gymnasts a greater margin of error in preflight and were only allowed during practice until that point. The mat is now mandatory: the 2006
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at the official website of the
International Federation of Gymnastics (FIG):Section 8.4, "Specific Apparatus Deductions (A Panel), page 34.
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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
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Her injury sparked major changes to the vaulting discipline of women's gymnastics with the goal of preventing such serious injuries.
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from the neck down. A subsequent accident at a
Japanese hospital, in which she became disconnected from her
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468:"A Gym Tragedy: Mother Says U.S. Athlete Fell Into a Coma Because of Treatment at a Tokyo Hospital"
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whose rapid rise through the ranks of elite gymnastics in the mid-1980s was cut short by a
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In May 1988, several months before the
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decided to increase vaulting safety by allowing U-shaped springboard
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without the safety mat results in an automatic score of zero.
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466:Hudson, Maryann (June 27, 1988).
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103:Senior international
30:Julissa D'Anne Gomez
451:"Gymnast paralyzed"
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35:Country represented
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78:(1991-08-08)
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332:References
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90:Discipline
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264:Aftermath
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297:See also
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210:Al Fong
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