Can anyone save the gym of the US scandal-plagued? Li Li Leung is determined to prove

There are places of drudgery, and then there is work Li Li Leung. As the new president and CEO of USA Gymnastics (USAG), Leung controls an organization struggling to justify their existence. After the big sponsors following the USAG participation went to one of the worst scandals in sports history, declared bankrupt group in December last year, and is now in danger of losing its national governing body status for the sport in the US Leung fourth new head of the USAG in two years and now has the reputation gymnastics recover in the United States and ‘organization that many gymnasts inherits against it feel working. Two gymnasts and USAG officials revealed that the report failed under its previous leadership, not just sexual abuse claims to the police immediately, but try to avoid becoming public these relationships. And even after hundreds of complaints from athletes against one man, former National physician Larry Nassar, stacked, appointed USAG involved a number of people with connections to high-ranking positions in the scandal. (In court, more than 150 women and girls from local athletes at the Olympic and members of the world team, said sexually them in the last two decades of abuse, some when they were as young as 8 years old, was in 2018, Nassar sentenced to 175 years in prison.) Some of them believe that the only way forward is to organize and manage to make a completely new body to represent the same gym. Leung is betting their careers that they can build new USAG inside. As a former gymnast, who wants athletes refer more to make it a priority to build confidence again, as the applause gymnasts chalk powder evaporates went their hands. He approached USAG last fall, resigned than their predecessors. “I want to achieve, you will not be CEO,” says Leung. “If that means I would have liked, so I would volunteer.” Heading the organization was not a sought after location and many potential candidates refused. Leung, however, he has decided to leave a comfortable job in the NBA to take the organization disgraced. Just two months after his tenure, Leung office at the headquarters of USAG in Indianapolis is still devoid of personal effects; one meeting with each employee for decoration and participation in competitions not long. (The first former Lead Turner USAG in 20 years, has also extended to the junior and national teams and senior held when they performed divides.) Some errors from the CEO have wondered if he grew up the task, but do not have their resolve shaken . “It’s not like you snap your fingers and have moved all over everything,” said the Olympic champion Nastia Liukin. “It will take some time.” With the Olympics, gymnastics spectacular showcases, threatening in a little over a year Leung has scribbled a number, 43, on a chalkboard that an entire wall of his office as a reminder of what their task is to occupy. “It is a time line for me, a countdown of days,” he said, declining to elaborate further. Leung did not need this job. As vice president of global partnerships in the NBA, he has been responsible for marketing, negotiations and relationships with brands like Nike, Samsung and Adidas care and friendliness just helped in London, Shanghai, Beijing and New life around the world adapt York. But after USAG self-destruction observed in recent years, he could no longer stand. “I always said to myself, ‘It’ll be better at some point,'” he says. “Over the course of two years, he did not. Because I have gained so much from the sport, I felt it was time to pay it forward.” When she was seven, she and her twin sister, May her first gymnastics class taken in may in Ridgewood, NJ the bold limelight, and license their bodies falling impossible heights and catapult left struck the girl as soon as Leung parents moved the family around Parsippany so the sisters to an elite can workout at gym. For 15 years, Leung has lived almost monastic life of elite athletes, training twice a day missing for 35 hours a week, most of the traditional teenage rites of passage, such as football games and school dances. The effort has gained both Leung and sister gymnastics scholarship to the University of Michigan, and his athletic career has also set for a less traditional challenge, while she was in the NBA contest in a regional first round of the American Ninja Warrior . (The variable levels sank.) In his new role that will focus enforce the new security policies for protected athletes gymnasts. It ‘was for sexual abuse survivors in pending cases, not to achieve, fall, although some have been in contact. He said that lawyers survivors in commissions, if she can, she wants to meet with them. “I do not see them as enemies at all,” he says. “I want to hear from them and would love to go to a part of the solution to be forward.” This partnership with survivors is as simple as it might not be hopes Leung, given to the top of their rocky start. In his first radio interview she revealed that Leung had also seen by Nassar, but said they have not been abused by him, because his coach was in the room. The survivors were offended; many had testified that Nassar abused them, under the pretext of treating them as their parents or coaches were unaware of the room, which he did. Leung has issued one apology quickly on social media. “I chose my words might be a little ‘artificial,” says a few days later relapse. “My comment is going through never had the terrible experience is to reduce the survivors. I continue to apologize for.” Then Leung hired Ed Nyman, a former gymnast and a biomechanics expert at the University of Findlay in Ohio , who had worked on the gym structure of the wife as medical link between athletes, coaches and the organization serve and supervise the care and well-being athletes. But “to lay [ed] secure athlete safety complaints openly involving him and his wife the gym.” On his first day, they fired after she says she has learned Nyman says the complaints about Safe Sports (a complaints body independent valued at about abuse athletes, regardless of whether they are in the sexual nature are) made, did not request a ‘formal investigation and people in USAG became known. He argues: Despite all the problems fighting with USAG, Leung is determined to rotate “I’ve never done anything that disqualified me for this job.”. The investigation by the United States Olympic Committee itself should USAG as a national governing body must be withdrawn due to the failure on certification pending, but hopes that the organization will financially solvent again later this year. That would give her time to make the case that USAG must remain the representative for the sport at the Tokyo game in 2020. “My goals are working in several key areas,” says the first critical year. “You can find a fair and full resolution using the survivors [Nassar]. The other is the athlete’s safety; We want to strengthen the athletes. And, finally, our financial stability is a big part. I think if you bring your order at home and do what is right, partnerships come. this way you can focus our athletes at the Olympic Games without any distractions. “Correcting June 17 the original version of this story misrepresentation Leung document in the NBA. She was vice president of global partnership, not president. The original version of this story false information to customers also Leung during the NBA. They did not want to work with Audi. This appears in the June 24, 2019 issue of time.
Picture copyright by Andrew Spear for TIME