Shawn Johnson Argumentative Essay

In 2008, Douglas watched Shawn Johnson perform her beam routine and was stunned by her performance. When the scoreboard showed Shawn’s name as the number one spot on beam, her and her coach, Liang Chow, hugged each other with so much warmth and joy. At that exact moment Douglas fell in love with Liang Chow and wanted him to be her coach. Douglas then states, “But I could feel it in my bones. Chow was the one” (95). Two years later in July 2010 Douglas was informed that Chow would be coming all the way out from West Des Moines, Iowa to Excalibur Gymnastics to teach a clinic. This was a once and a life time opportunity for Douglas to meet Chow. On the first day chow was there, he taught Douglas one of the most difficult vaults in gymnastics, the Amanar. During an Amanar one would execute 2 and a half twists off the vault and land feet first. Douglas realized that if Chow could teach her such a difficult skill in one day what other astonishing skills could he teach her? Douglas decided she wanted Chow …show more content…
First day they went through a normal session to get a feel for what it would be like to practice there. Chow told Douglas she still needed a lot of work and he would try his best to get her to the Olympics but there was no guarantee. After the first couple weeks of training there she gained ten pounds of muscle, she knew she had made the right choice of moving (133-136). Due to the pricey moving expenses Douglas had to stay with a host family while her family stayed in Virginia. Travis and Missy Parton were Douglas’s permanent host family. They had four daughters, Leah, Lexi, Hailey, and Elissa. Douglas was not used to living in such a big house compared to her home back in Virginia (137-140). Douglas knew she was giving up a lot to be able to train with Chow, but in the end, she knew it was going to make her a better gymnast and could potentially help her achieve her lifelong