Women's Vault Final

Gold - Sandra Izbasa ROU

Silver - McKayla Maroney USA

Bronze - Maria Paseka RUS

No beating around the bush is necessary. It was the second shocker of the Games for Team USA today when World Champion on the vault, McKayla Maroney, did not win the gold that has been so expected from her ever since she won the World Championship title last year (and probably even before that).

Had Maroney not gone out of the area on her amazing Amanar, which incurred a 0.300 penalty, she probably could have even still won the gold after uncharacteristically sitting down her second vault, the Mustafina. As it was, unfortunately Maroney did both of those things, and it was just one tenth too low for the gold medal.

Sandra Izbasa won the gold, performing vaults with D scores of 6.1 and 5.8, significantly lower than those of Maroney's super vaults. Nonetheless, she performed them cleanly and was able to score enough to take the gold medal. 

I am still proud of McKayla for winning the silver. I feel that there was so much pressure placed upon her to win gold and I think that was her downfall today, or at least a part of it. It looked like she was going very much for the stick, too much so. She has still been an asset to Team USA and is still the best vaulter in the world.

Maria Paseka took bronze, I wish that Chuso could've snuck in, but at this point it is what it is I guess!