Chellsie Memmel returning - as a specialist

Article from Dallas News:

Olympic gymnast Chellsie Memmel stopped by her parents' Milwaukee-area gym recently with her new Teddy Bear puppy, Lexi.
Andy Memmel, Chellsie's father and coach, folded up a piece of paper into an airplane and shot it at his daughter.
As Memmel unfurled it, she realized she was looking at a proposal for a new uneven bars routine.
"I could probably do that," she responded, her plans becoming clearer.

The fact that Memmel, in town this week to promote the Aug.12-15 Visa U.S. Championships at American Airlines Center, still wants to compete inspires a "huh?" from many observers.

This is the same gymnast who already won the world all-around title in 2005 and an Olympic silver with the U.S. team in August in Beijing – earned partially by Memmel's gutsy willingness to compete on the bars despite a broken ankle.
In June, she'll turn 21, close to ancient for female gymnasts. She already owns her own house. She could go to college.
What gives?
"I still love it, I still enjoy it," she said. "I needed a physical and mental break, but I'm starting to miss it again."

That's why Memmel is working out with a personal trainer. She'll need to start work on routines at her parents' gym full time within a month or so if she'll be able to compete here, and then possibly at the World Championships in October in London.
She has decided she won't compete in the all-around, sticking to bars and the balance beam.
Memmel hasn't attended any of the U.S. team camps this year in New Waverly, Texas, but has chatted with Martha Karolyi, the U.S. national team adviser, who told her she'd support whatever Memmel decided.
"It's hard to give something up," Memmel said Karolyi told her. She knows it well.

For all the glory she's earned, Memmel has carried more than her share of pain. She injured her foot leading up to the 2004 Athens Olympics, relegating her to alternate status. She ripped up her right shoulder while competing in the 2006 world championships, a lingering injury that put her comeback in doubt until weeks before the U.S. Olympic trials last summer.
Then, on the second day of training in Beijing, Memmel completed a tumbling pass and, upon landing, knew it all was in jeopardy again.
"I have impeccable timing with injuries," she said.
Despite the X-ray showing the ankle to be broken, Memmel fought through the pain on every landing from her bars routine leading up to and during the team preliminaries and final. She had no time to mourn the loss of her chance to compete in the other events.

Memmel performed on the ensuing Tour of Gymnastics Superstars last fall – along with Dancing With the Stars' Shawn Johnson and Parker golden girl Nastia Liukin. Liukin was in New York while Memmel visited town this week, so they couldn't meet up.
Memmel finally had surgery to insert a screw into the slow-healing ankle in January.

The comebacks are the worst, Memmel said. The soreness. More pain. But it would be worth it to do gymnastics again.
"You have to give 100 percent; she's done it for so many years," Andy Memmel said. "You tell her not to do it. It's just something that's in them, their drive."