How did Oklahoma gymnastics become a juggernaut? For Sooners, it starts on balance beam.
NORMAN ― K.J. Kindler stood alone across the practice gym, her eyes locked on the gymnast on the balance beam.
The OU women’s gymnastics coach changed positions as she watched. Hands on her hips, head tilted to one side. Bent over at her waist, hands on her knees. Leaned back against the wall. But Kindler’s eyes never left the gymnast.
Nothing distracted her.
No one bothered her.
Her Sooners know better than that.
“Beam is K.J.’s baby,” Sooner sophomore Jordan Bowers said with a smile. “She takes pride in that."
As well Kindler should ― her Sooners are beam queens.
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Balance beam takes marquee spot for Sooners
Balance beam will be front and center Sunday night as Utah comes to town for OU’s home opener. The Utes rank No. 1 in the event this season, the Sooners No. 2.
OU’s transformation into a gymnastics juggernaut ― five national titles in the past nine years ― has been fueled in large part by the Sooners’ dominance on the balance beam. Done on a four-inch wide beam four feet off the ground, it is the sport’s most iconic but precarious event. Most inconsistent, too.
But Kindler and her Sooners are consistent and excellent on the balance beam. They finished the regular season ranked No. 1 in the event seven consecutive years (2013-19), and while they dipped to second and third the past few years, beam is the event on which they finished and claimed their come-from-behind national title last season.
“When you have created and defined yourself as a beam team, as a national champion, that elevates your confidence,” said former Olympian and ESPN commentator Kathy Johnson Clarke.
“If you have a standard, if you have this expectation, you have to rise to it because that’s what you signed on to do. … You don’t come to Oklahoma if you don’t want to raise the level of your game on all events, but you’ve got to hit beam. You’ve got to hit beam. Period. Or you’re not winning anything.”
So, how has OU evolved into one of the best on beam?
It starts with Kindler.
What are OU gymnastics coach K.J. Kindler's biggest focal points?
While the OU coach has a hand in every event, her heaviest involvement comes on beam and floor. Both require choreography, and that is one of Kindler’s biggest strengths. But gymnastics excellence is about more than coming up with routines, or series as the combination of skills is called on balance beam.
“We are very detail oriented,” she said. “Every little detail, we’re looking at.”
During the offseason, that means breaking down the gymnasts’ balance beam routines to individual skills. Series are deconstructed. Skills are drilled.
Bowers, for example, spent much of the summer and fall learning how to do a proper roundoff, which was part of her dismount from the beam. For years, she switched her feet on her roundoff, and after Kindler had Bowers try other dismounts, the coach decided to reteach the skill.
That meant lots of hours spent on the low beam, a beam set inches off the ground used for training.
“You’re building your confidence down there, and then once you get up here,” Bowers said as she stood among the balance beams in the middle of OU’s practice gym, “you’re gonna hit it.”
Bowers has, finishing as OU’s top beam performer in its first two meets this season.
And her dismount includes a proper roundoff.
“So much easier,” she said. “I’m like, ‘Wow, where was this? I needed this years ago!’”
But Kindler doesn’t just drill individual beam-related skills during the offseason.
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'Beam is very mental' for OU gymnasts
A little over a week ago, Kindler spent time during beam practice with senior Ragan Smith. She would do a handstand, then Kindler would grab and hold her front plant foot when she landed. Again and again, they went. Handstand, grab and hold. Handstand, grab and hold.
“She kept moving her foot,” Kindler explained, “and once you move your foot, you’re not stable any longer.
“I wanted her feet pushing through her toes and the ball of her foot.”
But breaking down skills and drilling on details isn’t the only ingredient in OU’s secret sauce on balance beam. Leading up to competitions, Kindler does different in-practice competitions. One day, two gymnasts are paired together, and you take your partner’s score in determining the order in which you compete. Everyone feels pressure to do well for their partner.
Another day, everyone competes individually with all eyes on them and assistant coaches scoring each routine.
“We try to put them in situations of pressure on beam all the time,” Kindler said.
Because beam isn’t just technical.
“Beam is very mental,” Johnson Clarke said. “It’s not just physical. It’s both.”
And Johnson Clarke believes when it comes to balance beam, it is the mentality, the attitude, the confidence that separates good from great.
“So many people think beam is the scariest event and a dangerous event, and it’s not,” she said. “It is the easiest event to do, the hardest to complete.
“After I had retired and I hadn’t done gymnastics in a long time, if I’d go back to the gym, it’s like, ‘The first (event) I’ll do, I’ll do beam.’ I can do the stuff on beam. Now, can I compete it, stick it? Oh, hell no. I don’t have that mentality right now.”
Ragan Smith shining for Sooners on balance beam
Johnson Clarke saw that confidence in the Sooners this past Monday at LSU. In front of a packed arena and hostile crowd, OU went to its final event, beam, with the score closer than expected.
“There were a little nerves ― I saw it in a few of the moves ― but they still held pretty tight,” Johnson Clarke said.
And by the time Smith took to the beam, the Sooners’ anchor on the event only needed to score better than a 9.700 to win the dual.
She scored a 9.850.
Kindler knows how important the technical details and the practice drills are when it comes to balance beam. But the magic doesn’t happen without confidence. Lots and lots of confidence.
“Building your self-confidence … that’s a daily thing,” Kindler said. “It doesn’t just pop up with the season starts. I have to constantly be telling them, ‘You are great. You are amazing.’
“They believe it.”
So does anyone who sees the crimson and cream beam queens.
Jenni Carlson: Jenni can be reached at 405-475-4125 or jcarlson@oklahoman.com. Like her at facebook.com/JenniCarlsonOK, follow her at twitter.com/jennicarlson_ok, and support her work and that of other Oklahoman journalists by purchasing a digital subscription today.
How to watch OU vs. Utah women's gymnastics
6:45 p.m. Sunday at Lloyd Noble Center in Norman (ESPN)
This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: OU gymnastics: K.J. Kindler built Sooners' dynasty on balance beam
