When I was younger, my coach, Liang Chow, made all the decisions. I would go to the gym for practice, do exactly what Chow told me to do, go home, come back and start all over again. If Chow told me to do 50 squat jumps, I did 50 squat jumps.

People put too much emphasis on looks.

When it comes to gymnastics, you can be 30 points ahead going into that competition, but on that day, it's all about luck. It's about who has a good day, who stays healthy, it's how happy the judges are that day, there are so many different factors.

I've never had a teammate competing with me my whole life.

It's nearly every country's tactic to keep their greatest competitors a secret.

I had a constant fear, a constant little doubt in my mind: 'OK, I'm getting ready to do my standing back full on beam and I might re-tear my ACL.'

My approach to gymnastics in Beijing was heavily based on the amount of difficulty I could do.