Carly Rae Patterson (born February 4, 1988 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana) is an American gymnast. She currently lives in Allen, Texas.

Patterson was at a cousin's birthday party at a gymnastics club in 1994 when a coach noticed her doing cartwheels and roundoffs and told her mother that she should start taking lessons, which she did soon afterward.

In 2000, Patterson participated in the Top Gym Tournament in Belgium; she won the silver medal in the all-around and the bronze medal for balance beam, which she has said is her favorite event. At the 2001 American Team Cup, she first performed her signature beam dismount, an Arabian double front.

At the 2001 Goodwill Games in Brisbane, Australia, she was ranked second in the all-around before the final rotation. She was suffering from a stomach illness, however, and she missed three landings on the floor exercise and finished seventh overall.

Patterson was named the U.S. Junior National All-Around champion in 2002. She had previously received fourth place in 2000 and third place in 2001. At the 2003 World Gymnastics Championships in Anaheim, California, she earned the all-around silver medal —the first time an American woman had won an all-around medal at that competition since 1994. She also helped her team to earn the team gold medal.

In 2004, she tied with Courtney Kupets to become a co-champion in the all-around event at the U.S. Gymnastics Championships.

During the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, Patterson won a gold medal in the Women's Individual All-Around, an achievement that had only been attained by one other American gymnast, Mary Lou Retton, during the Soviet Union-boycotted 1984 Summer Olympics. In addition, she won a silver medal in the Women's Team competition.

On August 23, she competed in the finals for the beam event where she received a score of 9.775 and won the silver medal.

Leading up to the 2004 Olympic Games, she was prepared by her two Russian coaches: the famous Soviet acrobat Evgeny Marchenko, who immigrated to the United States from Latvia after the Collapse of the Soviet Union, and Natalya Boyarskaya.

The following are the routines Carly performed at the 2004 Olympic Games:

VAULT: Double-twisting Yurchenko (start value 9.8)
BARS: Kip, cast to handstand, underswing full pirouette, toe shoot to high bar; kip, cast to handstand, stalder full pirouette, giant 1.5 pirouette, giant full pirouette, Tkatchev release, pak salto to low bar; kip, cast to handstand 1/2 pirouette, stalder shoot to high bar; kip, cast to handstand, giant, giant, full-twisting double back dismount (start value 9.9)
BEAM: Jump to middle split, needle scale; standing Arabian; front aerial, back handspring, back layout stepout; punch front, sheep jump; switch leap, back tuck; full turn; roundoff, back handspring, Arabian double front dismount (start value 10.0)
FLOOR: Popa, tuck jump double; roundoff-back handspring-half in half out somersault; roundoff-back handspring-Arabian double front; switch leap, tour jete full; roundoff-back handspring-2.5 twist-front layout; 1.5 pirouette; cat leap double, cat leap 1.5; roundoff-back handspring-double pike (start value 10.0)

Carly Patterson has made numerous guest appearances and has done the talk show circuit since winning gold. For the time being, she's returned to an almost-normal life in Allen, TX. It is not yet known whether she plans to participate in the 2008 Olympic Games; as her coach said in a recent TV interview, "It's hard to top an All-Around Gold." Carly has stayed occupied with event appearances, gymnastics-related and otherwise. She has also been busy dealing with her sponsors: Wheaties, Tyson Chicken, Visa, and the American Dental Association. She also has finished her authorized biography, which will be released on November 30, 2005.

First announced in a March 2005 interview, Carly is slowly beginning to enter the music scene. On August 21, 2005, she gave an interview on FOX Sports Net's Sports Sunday in which she gave more details on her future career. She sang a small clip of "Damaged" and said that she went to New York City to record the demo. On December 18, 2005, she announced that she signed a demo contract for four songs with Papa Joe's Records, owned by Joe Simpson, father of Jessica and Ashlee Simpson. She will be working on the songs in LA and hopes to have four more demos completed by March 2006.