The Junior Men’s competition at the 2015 P&G Gymnastics Championships at the Bankers Life Fieldhouse.
INDIANAPOLIS – Last year, a great first day of competition saw Peter Daggett in striking distance of a stellar P&G U.S. Gymnastics Championships debut.
Then the East Longmeadow, Mass. native let himself look too far ahead to a Junior National Team berth and fell on floor exercise and vault on day two, dropping him from fifth to tenth in the standings. That coveted national team status would have to wait another year.
“Last year, I had a really good first day,” said the 18 year old. “But in the off period, I let myself get a little too high and let myself think that I was all set for making the national team, when it was really only halftime.”
It’s now halftime of Daggett’s second P&G Championships, and to continue the football analogy, he will start the second half with possession. Hitting all six routines, he finished the first day of competition at Bankers Life Fieldhouse in second place with an overall score of 84.050, putting him on quality ground for that elusive Junior National Team spot.
“I’ve learned now to pace myself,” said Daggett. “There’s six more events to do, six more routines to hit, and I’ll go from there.”
Maturity hasn’t been Daggett’s only growth area since last August. His recent move to start school at the University of Oklahoma has pushed his gymnastics in an entirely new direction. He now rooms with two other competitors in this weekend’s junior men’s division, current leader Yul Moldauer and Levi Anderson, who sits in sixth.
Daggett hasn’t added tremendous difficulty (though he insists he has upgrades he should be able to show off next year), but every move is that much more exact. Spending time in a college gym with some of the nation’s best senior gymnasts stresses those details.
“It’s a lot different training with guys like Jake Dalton and Steven Legendre, senior national team guys I’ve looked up to my entire life,” said Daggett. “Watching everything, watching those little tiny details, those things they do a little bit better than anyone else that get them to that level.”
One of those details Daggett improved upon the most were his dismounts, and those lifted him above all but Moldauer on Friday afternoon.
“My landings have gotten a lot better,” said Daggett. “I’m not typically one to do very well on the sticking portion of it. But I’d say that went pretty well today. I’d say I stuck my routines today that I don’t usually stick.”
If he can stick his landings again in Sunday night’s finals, he might clinch the National Team spot that has served as motivation since last year. But membership in another team, Oklahoma, may now spark his efforts even more. Now he wants success now just not for himself, but for his two other Sooner teammates who are competing alongside him.
“I had teammates back at home, but it was nothing like a college team,” said Daggett. “These two guys are my roommates. We live together. We’ve only been together for a month and a half and we’re already best friends. It’s great.”