Umphrey’s balance no act…

Wednesday, May 15, 1996

Aspiring Olympian, doctor working toward both dreams
simultaneously

By Esther Hui

Daily Bruin Staff

Bruin alumni gymnast Chainey Umphrey is quite a balanced person
­ in more ways than one.

For the past 10 years, the two driving forces in Umphrey’s life
have been making the Olympic team and becoming an orthopedic
surgeon.

So when he found that the MCAT ­ an exam for medical school
­ would only be offered twice this year and the dates fell
during the World Championships (an important competition leading up
to the Olympics) in April and the Olympics in August, Umphrey had
to make a quick decision.

Not surprisingly, neither goal was going to take precedence, and
Umphrey was off to Puerto Rico not only to compete in the 1996
individual World Championships but to take the MCAT as well. An
eclectic mix of academic and athletic dreams all in one
weekend.

That Friday night around 10 p.m., Umphrey competed in the high
bar finals, the last event of the championships. Umphrey took a
slight hop on his dismount to place fifth in the world, the highest
of any American at the championships.

After interviews, Umphrey finally got to bed around 3 a.m. Three
hours later he was up again, this time to take the eight hour MCAT
exam. After all of the weekend’s ups and downs, Umphrey adds only
as a side note the fact that due to a mix-up the test directions
were given in Spanish.

"It was a roller coaster, pretty amazing," Umphrey said of the
weekend. "The funny thing about the MCAT is that I almost didn’t
have time to get nervous. Because I had so much to do, it took away
some pressures, it became a different kind of pressure."

For Umphrey, the weekend ended the stress of two months of
balancing intense studying for the MCAT and four to six hours of
daily gymnastics workouts. These days, Umphrey feels as if he’s
been blessed with free time, just about the same time that most
Olympic hopefuls are beginning to feel the pressure of the pending
June Olympic trials.

"To tell you the truth, I don’t know how I did it," Umphrey
said. "I got used to having a continual headache, I wasn’t getting
any sleep. Everything was planned out to the very second.

"I had when I had to wake up, the time when I had to work out in
the morning, when I had to be back, how much I’d have for a nap
­ 20 minutes. Which for most people sounds pretty ridiculous,
but that gave me like another five hours of juice.

"I wanted to put more time into workout, but I knew I couldn’t
afford it, so I had to pick up my intensity so I could get more
done in practice than I normally did. They were intense, intense
times. Everything’s on the line, your whole career and the future.
And it all happened like that."

Here Umphrey lets his breath out. The Olympic trials and
Olympics are still to come, but for Umphrey the most intense of it
is over.

"It’s really been amazing," Art Shurlock, Umphrey’s head coach
at UCLA for the past seven years, said. "To be able to put in that
amount of time everyday studying and workout, and continuing to do
both at a high level, is a testament to his motivation and
dedication to achieve both of those goals.

"Some people can do it and some people can’t. Gymnasts at a high
level are so motivated, they can really put in an unbelievable
effort. Chainey has an indomitable spirit towards working towards
what he thinks he can achieve. He wants to be an orthopedic
surgeon, and he will be."

It’s almost ironic that the major athletic and academic goals in
Umphrey’s life for the past 10 years should come to a head during
the same weekend. Umphrey originally began mapping out a path to
medical school after he broke his leg doing gymnastics in 1986, a
year after winning the all-around in the Junior National
championships.

The injury eventually kept him from challenging for a spot on
the 1988 Olympic team, but his experience with medicine became an
inspiration for him to become a doctor himself.

"I broke my leg and I had to learn how to walk again, I couldn’t
walk," Umphrey said. "I went from feeling like I had all the world
to nothing. When I came out of the cast my leg was so distorted, I
remember just crying. I was saying, ‘Oh, my God,’ it didn’t even
look like a leg to me, I couldn’t even touch my leg.

"I remember the doctor walking over and he looked at it, put his
hand over it and smoothed it, and he said, ‘Man, you’re going to be
in great shape, this is excellent.’ That was when I knew. That guy
completely changed my life. I went from absolute mental torment to
hey, OK, maybe I can back into it. That was when I knew I wanted to
be a doctor, to have the power to give hope and heal."

Umphrey had a successful career at UCLA, beginning in 1989 and
culminating at the 1993 NCAAs, where he placed second in the
all-around. Nationally, Umphrey has been part of the 14-member
national team since 1989, placing fifth at the most recent Winter
Cup.

In 1992, Umphrey broke his foot and was unable to compete up
until the Olympic trials. Entering the meet unranked, Umphrey ended
up placing eighth, becoming a non-travelling alternate. This year
is the first time in three Olympics that Umphrey will enter the
trials uninjured.

"All that stuff comes up," Umphrey said. "You remember all of
those hard times, all these things start shooting back at you, it
begins to play with your mind a little bit."

On June 5, Umphrey will compete in the USA championships which
will determine the qualifiers to the Olympic trials, of which seven
will suit up in Atlanta for the Olympic Games.

"He’s achieved the level of (Bruin olympians) Peter Vidmar,
Mitch Gaylord and Tim Dagget, who were really at the top of their
game ­ top quality nationally and internationally," Shurlock
said. "The one thing he wants under his belt is to be an
Olympian."