Five members of the Minnesota Men’s Gymnastics program descended on the US Olympic & Paralympic Training Center in Colorado Springs over the June 27th weekend in a quest to qualify for the 2026 US Nationals to be held in Phoenix, AZ in August 6-9. 

David Grossman (last year’s lone qualifier to US Nationals), Ben Letvin (2026 GymACT National Champion of FX & V), Owen Frank (2026 All American on SR), Warren Strootman, and Kellen Ryan (recently returned to Minnesota after two years at Penn State) performed admirably in Session 1 of the US Qualifier that had approximately 30 gymnasts all with the same goal in mind. 

Kellen Ryan put on a clinic, hitting a 6 for 6 performance that earned him the All-Around title in the first session with a score of 76.90.

Based on the qualification procedures for US Nationals, this finish in Session 1 would prove to be extremely beneficial to Kellen’s chances to make it to Phoenix. 

The rest of our guys had mixed reviews in terms of their performances, and the other 4 would have to wait and see how the second session panned out to see who might make it to the next stage. 

Ben Letvin was our next highest all-around finisher with a score of 74.85 which put him in 4th place in our session but it included 2 falls throughout the meet. However, he did some of his better routines on several events, including a stuck Kasamatsu 1 1/2 on Vault that earned him a huge score of 14.25 - the highest score of the first session on Vault. 

David Grossman, competing in his first all-around meet since the US Nationals in New Orleans back in August of 2025, had a solid outing, finishing a close second in Vault behind Ben with a big score of 14.05 on the same vault Ben performed. His All-Around score of 73.50 put him in 6th place in the All Around in Session 1. His 13.00 on Parallel Bars earned him the 5th highest spot on that event in this Session. 

Warren Strootman also competed in the All Around and posted a season-high score of 72.50 that included a beautiful Floor Exercise routine that earned him a score of 13.10 and 6th place finish in Session 1.

Senior Owen Frank unfortunately had one of those meets where he underperformed in a few areas. He competed on the same two events he competed on at GymACT Nationals - Still Rings and Parallel Bars. An All American on Still Rings at GymACT Nationals, he had a few mistakes at this meet that cost him, but it was great to have such a big squad competing at this prestigious meet. 

The individual event placings are very important in this meet because the qualification to US Nationals is based on a point system that is dependent upon those event placings.  The top-10 places on each event received pre-determined points that, when totaled, give us a ranking based on total points earned. 

At the end of the entire meet (there was a second session of 26 athletes that still had to compete), the final points ranking would be determined and the top 9 gymnasts based on the point system rankings would qualify to US Nationals. After those 9 gymnasts were selected, the next 4 qualifiers would be selected based on All-Around rankings (the top 9-point recipients would be removed from the AA rankings to select those next 4 spots). It’s a little complicated to explain but it works well to get guys qualified to US Nationals.

When the dust cleared and all the points were tabulated, we had 2 of our 5 gymnasts qualified for US Nationals:

• Ben Letvin tied for 9th place in the points ranking with 11 points based on his 1st place ranking on Vault!

• Kellen Ryan was the first gymnast selected based on All Around rankings (he finished 4th overall in the All Around after scores from both sessions were combined).

David Grossman finished with 9 points by virtue of his 3rd place overall finish on Vault, narrowly missing the cutoff to qualify. 

‘I’m so proud of the way these guys performed today,’ said head coach Mike Burns. ‘They hung together as a team, and it was great to have such a large group of guys hungry to take it to the next level.’

Former Gopher Olympian Shane Wiskus was also competing to qualify to US Nationals, and he came in with a fire in his belly, winning the All-Around title with a big score of 84.157, 4 points higher than the All-Around runner up. 

‘It was great to see Shane do so well at this meet,’ said coach Burns. ‘I’m not sure I’ve seen him look better!’

Former University of Minnesota Women’s Assistant Coach Doug Day put our entire contingent up at his house – known as the “DAY’S INN”!!! “I’ve been good friends with Doug since I met him at a summer gymnastics camp in 1975,’ said Coach Burns. ‘Putting seven of us up at his house in the mountains of Colorado Springs was a great experience and Doug treated us to some great stories of the good old days of gymnastics!’

Many thanks to my good friend Doug Day!!

JACK GAGAMOV EXCELS AT THE CZECH REPUBLIC NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS

Junior Jack Gagamov competed at the 2026 Czech National Championships back on June 13th & 14th, two weeks before the US Qualifier. The meet was held in Trinec, Czech Republic. Jack has dual citizenship and brought a taste of Gopher excellence to Eastern Europe.

Jack had an outstanding meet and placed 3rd in the All Around with a score of 74.366 and securing the Bronze Medal. He also qualified for the individual event finals in three events: Floor Exercise, Parallel Bars, and High Bar.

The event finals were held on Sunday, June 14th and Jack was able to come home with two more medals to add to his All Around Bronze.

On Floor Exercise, Jack did one of his best routines of the season and was able to secure the Gold Medal with an outstanding score of 13.625. On High Bar Jack did another outstanding routine that earned him a 13.35 score, good enough to take home the Silver Medal! Huge congratulations to Jack on his performance at Czech Nationals!