FORT WORTH, TEXAS - The Navy men's gymnastics program was on premier national stage this past weekend as recent Naval Academy graduate Ryan McVay was one of 33 athletes competing at the 2021 U.S. Gymnastics Championships in Fort Worth, Texas on Thursday and Saturday. Entered as an all-around competitor, McVay flashed his skill set on the floor exercise, pommel horse, still rings, vault, parallel bars and high bar at Dickies Arena with the potential to advance to the U.S. Olympic Trials. After two rounds of nationally-televised competition, McVay finished as the 23rd-best all-around gymnast in the country on Saturday night.

"Competing at the U.S. Championships was always a goal of mine and I am beyond grateful for the opportunity to compete at this year's event," remarked McVay after the meet. "I went into the competition with the mindset to just have fun and soak in the entire experience. Although day one was was tough, I ended up having a solid meet on the second day to close out my gymnastics career. I'm glad I was able to go out there and represent my brothers with Navy on my chest one last time. Thanks to the amazing support of my family, teammates, coaches and countless others, I was able to proudly represent Navy one last time."

After qualifying for this opportunity through his tenth-place performance at the 2021 NCAA Championships in April, McVay began his competition on Thursday with an all-around score of 75.0 points. A 13.0-point result on the floor exercise was his top event score of the evening as he tallied a 12.75 on both the pommel horse and rings before netting 12.7 points on the vault and 12.65 on the high bar. An 11.15 on the parallel bars rounded out McVay's first day scores. Two days later on Saturday night, he improved on four of those scores as he posted a 13.3 on the rings, 13.15 on the vault and 13.1 on the floor. His strong effort continued with a 12.65 on the parallel bars, 12.55 on the pommel horse and 12.45 on the high bar for a cumulative score of 77.2. The combination of his day one and day two totals ranked McVay 23rd overall in the all-around standings with 152.2 points. In terms of individual events, he placed 19th overall on the floor exercise, 19th on the pommel horse, 22nd on the rings, 27th on the vault, 23rd on the parallel bars and 19th on the high bar.

"Our team and coaching staff could not be more proud of what Ryan accomplished this past weekend at the U.S. Championships in Fort Worth," exclaimed head coach Kip Simons. "Ryan was a boss as he stepped onto the biggest stage this country has to offer and competed like you would expect a member of NMG to compete. The field was deep and tough with past Olympians and other athletes preparing for their shot at making the 2021 Olympic team, but Ryan stayed in control of his performance and left it all out on the competition floor. He can now retire after dedicating his life to this sport and begin his career as a Naval Officer. Ryan's qualification and outstanding performance will help continue to elevate our program onto the national stage."

Brady Malone, Yul Moldauer and Sam Mikulak finished top-three in the all-around event and will be top contenders for the United States' Olympic team that will be selected later this month.