Members of the UF gymnastics team said they trained harder than ever last week in practice.
Amid a sea of pink, it showed in Friday night's Link to Pink meet against Kentucky (1-3, 0-3 Southeastern Conference).
Fueled by Melanie Sinclair's perfect 10 on uneven bars, the Gators (3-1, 2-1 SEC) rebounded with a 195.925 to 193.85 win.
The team led after the first event, vault, and practically put away the Wildcats on bars.
Sinclair's 10, sandwiched between 9.9s from teammates Maranda Smith and Corey Hartung, gave the Gators a comfortable lead.
"Actually, I woke up this morning, and I honestly felt, like, so good that I could do anything," Sinclair said. "When I was warming up bars, everything just came so fluid."
UF coach Rhonda Faehn had a good feeling about Sinclair before the meet even started.
"Her warm-up - I said that's 10.0 material right there," she said.
The 10 was Sinclair's third career 10. Her first came against the same foe, Kentucky, on Feb. 16, 2007.
The whole team performed well on bars, not scoring lower than a 9.8.
The team's success didn't carry over to balance beam.
For the third consecutive week, beam proved to be UF's weakest event. The team turned in a 48.125.
"We just keep having stupid mistakes on the beam," Hartung said. "One bad beam rotation is fine, but not two - like (Friday). Having a second one (Friday) is unacceptable."
Following the 10, Sinclair led off on beam. Hyped up from her perfect score, she faltered a bit on the dismount.
"I was really antsy going into beam," she said. "I was shaking after my 10 so it was hard - I was first on beam - so it was hard to bring my heart rate back down and get grounded so I can do my beam routine. I was still a little anxious on my dismount."
Faehn attributed the continuing beam troubles to injuries.
"We have, still, injured athletes," she said. "We've had a different lineup every week on beam and we've had a different order and it's just because we haven't been able to have the athletes consistently healthy to be able to go in."
Sinclair said there was improvement on beam, though, and statistically there was.
"Going aggressive and making mistakes is better, and that's just the next step to hitting your routines perfect," she said.
Hartung, who fell off beam last week against Arkansas, showed why the fall was uncharacteristic. Against Kentucky, she scored a 9.9 on beam, good for the beam title.
"I'll take the 9.9 for tonight, but I know I can score better," Hartung said.
Despite troubles on beam, it wasn't enough for the Gators to relinquish the lead on floor exercise, though it was enough for the team to lose some of the swagger it had before beam.
The team scored a 49.05 on floor, its lowest output on floor this season.
"I think that carried over a little bit into floor," Faehn said. "They lost that energy and that momentum and so we lost some tenths on floor as well."
