34 | JUNE 9 • 2022 

A

lan Gerdov and Adam Wooten 
are close friends who love gym-
nastics, music and their family.
That friendship will take them to Israel 
in July.
The former University of Michigan men’s 
gymnastics teammates will each travel to 
Israel for the first time to represent the 
United States as gymnasts on Team USA at 
the 21st Maccabiah Games.
For Gerdov, 23, whose parents fled 
Ukraine in 1989 to escape religious perse-
cution when the country was controlled by 
the Soviet Union, the Maccabiah Games 
will mark the end of his injury-filled gym-
nastics career.
The Lincolnshire, Ill., resident was cut 
from the U-M gymnastics team as a fresh-

man walk-on because of a bad back — he 
suffered a stress fracture in his back when 
he was a sophomore in high school — but 
he was asked to be an undergraduate coach 
and he did that as a sophomore in 2019.
At the time, he said, he was prepared for 
the realization that competing in gymnas-
tics was no longer possible for him.
But he fought his way back onto the U-M 
team after not competing for two seasons, 
determined to let the world know “that 
I still had it,
” and he was on the team for 
three eventful seasons.
His junior season ended early because 
of the COVID-19 pandemic; he missed his 
senior season because of knee surgery; and 
he competed this season as a graduate stu-
dent and one of the team’s three captains.

Gerdov’s first meet for U-M, the Windy 
City Invitational in Chicago in January 
2020, also was Wooten’s first meet for the 
Wolverines, who won the invitational for 
the first time in several years. Gerdov was a 
junior and Wooten was a freshman.
“If you would have told me when I was a 
sophomore at U-M that I’
d be a captain of 
a two-time Big Ten Conference champion 
gymnastics team and finish my gymnastics 
career on Team USA in Israel, meeting 
and competing against other Jewish ath-
letes from across the world, I would have 
laughed at you, thought you were crazy,
” 
Gerdov said.
What’s even crazier is Gerdov’s schedule 
after he returns to the U.S. from a three-
week stay in Israel on July 27.

Former U-M gymnastics teammates will 
compete for Team USA at the Maccabiah Games.

They’re ‘Beaming’
Over Their Trip to Israel

STEVE STEIN CONTRIBUTING WRITER
Adam Wooten (left) and Alan 
Gerdov react to a teammate's 
floor exercise routine.

SPORTS
ON THE COVER

MICHIGAN ATHLETICS