Silver medal a 'beautiful thing'

ATHENS — In a gymnasium appropriately only half full, Guard Young finally felt the pleasant weight of an Olympic medal hanging around his neck.

Young is a gymnast, a male gymnast at that — not the most heralded of sports in the universe. For the past 17 years he has been working at his chosen sport in relative anonymity, doing it for the chase, not for the riches and the glory. He has run into dead-ends, setbacks and disappointments, but the successes have somehow always snatched redemption from the jaws of rejection. Just as they did last night when Young teamed with Blaine Wilson, Jason Gatson, Brett McClure and the Hamm twins, Morgan and Paul, to claim the silver medal for the United States in the men's gymnastics team competition at the Athens Olympics. Japan won the gold and Romania the bronze.

"After I got the medal, I took some time on the stand and thought back on my life and all I've gone through," said Young, who got started in gymnastics when he was 10 years old living in Salt Lake City. "It hasn't been easy. But I'm glad I did it."

It's an old story, but one that never gets old. For all their largesse, controversy and contradictions, the Olympics at their best still come down to this: a place where boyhood goals and dreams are realized in adulthood — and dedication and hard work are paid off in full.

"After my wife and my child," said the 27-year-old Young, looking down at his medal, "this is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen."

He dedicated his triumph to his father, Wayne Young, who captained the U.S. Olympic gymnastics team in Montreal in 1976, 11 years before Guard was born. "I owe this to my dad," he said. "He never pushed me to follow in his footsteps, but he gave me every opportunity if I wanted to."

When Guard Young began training as a gymnast with Chris Leach All-American Gymnastics in Salt Lake City, he said he hung a poster of his father on one side of his bedroom. On the other side he hung a poster of Peter Vidmar, the gymnast who led the way to a first-ever men's team gold medal for the United States at the Los Angeles Games in 1984.

"I've never taken them down," he said. "I grew up wanting to be them."

Both Wayne Young and Peter Vidmar were in the stands Monday night.

"I'm so nervous I don't know what to do," said Wayne Young before the competition. "I think they have a good chance to medal, but in this sport, you never know. You have to hang in there."

Perseverance is something of a Young family trait. Wayne Young didn't even get started as a gymnast until he was a freshman at BYU. He was a diver at Provo High School and only dabbled in gymnastics by hanging around the gym at BYU.