Brody Malone finished the last Olympic cycle as the top U.S. male gymnast. He's back atop the leaderboard to start the new Olympic cycle.
Malone, a 22-year-old Stanford standout, tallied 88.942 points on the first of two nights of competition at the U.S. Championships in Tampa on Thursday. He leads by 3.462 points, shattering the record margin for one day in U.S. men's history, over Asher Hong going into Saturday, when national champions will be crowned.
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Last year, Malone won his senior nationals debut, displacing six-time U.S. all-around champion Sam Mikulak.
Malone, a former rodeo competitor and frog gigger from a four-square-mile Georgia hometown, then placed 10th in the Tokyo Olympic all-around and missed a high bar medal by one spot.
The Americans finished fifth in the Olympic team event and went medal-less across all the men's events at the Games for the first time since 2000.
Collectively, the U.S. men are now focused on performing more difficult routines to increase their start values. The reserved Malone is thrust into a leadership role with Mikulak retired.
The goal, by the 2024 Paris Games, if not before, is to be competitive with world powers China, Japan and Russia (which is banned indefinitely from international competition due to the war in Ukraine).
The men are incentivized at nationals to start throwing harder skills with bonus points - sometimes more than a full point per routine.
The all-around winner clinches a spot on the five-man team for the world championships in two months. That roster will be finalized after an October selection camp. The U.S. is a medal contender given Olympic champion Russia's absence. The last U.S. men's team medal at an Olympics or worlds came in 2014.
Nationals continue Friday with the first of two nights of women's competition.
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Brody Malone leads U.S. Gymnastics Championships by record margin originally appeared on NBCSports.com