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Mary Lou Retton, who became one of the most popular athletes in the country after winning the all-around women\u2019s gymnastics competition at the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, has pneumonia and is \u201cfighting for her life\u201d in the intensive care unit, her daughter said in a statement this week.<\/p>\n
Retton\u2019s daughter, McKenna Lane Kelley, said on Instagram that her mother \u201cis not able to breathe on her own\u201d and that she had been in the intensive care unit for more than a week.<\/p>\n
Kelley did not share more specific information about her mother\u2019s condition, though she said that her pneumonia was \u201ca very rare form.\u201d It was not clear what hospital Retton was in.<\/p>\n
Kelley, who was a gymnast at Louisiana State University, did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment on Tuesday.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
At the 1984 Olympics, Retton, became the first American woman<\/a> to win the all-around gold medal or any individual Olympic medal in gymnastics. Going into the final rotation of the competition, she was five-hundredths of a point behind Romania\u2019s Ecaterina Szabo, and the only way she could beat Szabo was to score a perfect 10 on vault.<\/p>\n Retton scored a perfect 10.<\/p>\n She won five medals in Los Angeles, including two silvers, for team and vault, and two bronzes, for uneven bars and floor exercise.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Though there was an asterisk by Retton\u2019s victory in the history books \u2014 the Soviet Union, which was the most dominant force in women\u2019s gymnastics at the time, boycotted the 1984 Games \u2014 it nonetheless made her a sports hero in the United States. In addition to earning her the traditional trappings of Olympic gold, like appearing on a Wheaties box, she was widely viewed as an inspiration to a new generation of American girls entering gymnastics.<\/p>\n Even as the American gymnastics program grew and the country won more medals, including the team gold in 1996, Retton\u2019s prominence remained: For 20 years, Retton, now 55, was the only American woman to win the all-around title, until Carly Patterson became the second in 2004.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Retton was born in Fairmont, W.Va., and got her start early, like many top gymnasts<\/a>. By the time Retton was 7 years old, she was training in gymnastics full-time.<\/p>\n Retton\u2019s talent had been apparent from the start, but a big break came at an Olympics elimination tournament in Reno, Nev., in 1982, where she impressed Bela Karolyi, who would go on to coach her in the 1984 Olympics.<\/p>\n \u201cI immediately recognized the tremendous physical potential of this little kid,\u201d Karolyi said in a March 1984 interview.<\/p>\n