Justin Spring is entering the 2025 gymnastics season as the new associate head coach.
“I am deeply grateful for this opportunity and am humbled by the trust placed in me. I’m excited to continue to grow and contribute alongside such talented individuals,” Spring said. “I look forward to continuing to push this program towards great things.”
Spring took this promotion after serving as an assistant coach since June 2022. In his two seasons as an assistant coach, Spring helped lead the team to its 39th NCAA championships appearance.
In his time coaching the Crimson Tide, Spring oversaw the vault unit. He helped lead 22 different vault routines to land scores of 9.9 or higher in the 2024 season alone. The 2024 vault season featured two perfect 10s, one from former gymnast Luisa Blanco and one from senior Lilly Hudson. In the 2023 season, then-sophomore Gabby Gladieux clinched the vault title at the SEC championships.
After the 2024 season, Spring traveled to Paris to be an Olympic artistic gymnastics announcer. While at the Olympics, Spring watched Blanco compete for Team Colombia.
“This is a job I’ve dreamed about doing since I watched my first Olympics in 1996,” Spring said. “I’ve always been passionate about getting people excited for the Olympic movement.”
Along with aiding high-scoring vault routines, he has also helped four gymnasts earn a combined total of 17 All-American honors. In the 2024 season, 13 gymnasts were named Scholastic All-Americans. That was the program’s 14th consecutive season with 10 or more honorees and 18th season since 1999.
Before coaching at Alabama, Spring was a collegiate and Olympic gymnast.
He competed at Illinois and earned multiple accolades. He was a 13-time All-American, two-time Dike Eddleman Athlete of the Year, three-time All-Big Ten Team Member, and one-time Big Ten Gymnast of the Year.
Spring won three Big Ten Championship event titles: floor exercise in 2004 and parallel bars and all-around in 2006. At the national level, he won four NCAA event titles: high bar in 2004 and 2006 and parallel bars in 2005 and 2006. Spring was also a 2005 U.S. National High Bar champion.
During and after his time as a collegiate gymnast, Spring competed at the elite level. He was an eight-time member of the U.S. Senior National Team, and between 2005 and 2007, he won five high bar medals. He was a two-time gold medalist, two-time silver medalist, and one-time Winter Cup champion on the high bar.
Spring was a one-time silver medalist on the floor in 2007 and a gold medalist on the parallel bars in 2008.
In 2008, Spring competed on the U.S. men’s gymnastics team at the Beijing Olympics, and his performances helped lead the U.S. team to a bronze medal. Spring competed on the vault, parallel bars, horizontal bar and floor during the team finals. Spring scored a 15.9 on the vault, a 15.85 on the parallel bars, 15.675 on the horizontal bar and 15.2 on the floor.
“But we just competed freely for each other, excited to be there and looked up at the scoreboard going in the last event like, oh man, we’re in this thing. And then we walked away with the bronze team. It was really cool,” Spring said of the 2008 Olympics to WVTM 13.
Spring gained coaching experience at his alma mater, the University of Illinois. He was on the coaching staff for 16 seasons and was head coach for 12. As a coach, he was named 2012 National Coach of the Year after Illinois won its 10th NCAA championship.
As part of the Illinois coaching staff, Spring helped lead the team to 11 top-six finishes at the NCAA championships and four Big Ten championships. In 2010, 2011, 2012, and 2018, he was named Big Ten Coach of the Year, and in 2010 and 2011, he was also named Central Region Coach of the Year.
Head coach Ashley Johnston said Spring brings valuable knowledge of the sport to the coaching staff and is only expected to continue to grow as a coach.
“For the past three years, Justin’s enthusiasm, passion and experience in and around the sport of gymnastics has had such a strong and meaningful impact on our program,” Johnston said. “As an NCAA champion and an Olympian, he does a wonderful job of sharing his knowledge and wisdom to our student-athletes with an energetic and joyful approach.”
