UCLA Gymnastics head coach Chris Waller has made his first coaching staff hire, bringing back former UCLA All-American and U.S. National Team member Kristina Comforte as an associate head coach.

"I am incredibly excited to have Kristina back at UCLA," Waller said. "As an athlete, she had a fierce competitive spirit that radiated off of her. Now as a coach, Kristina feeds that competitive spirit by investing in the whole person, helping foster champions by nurturing character."

Comforte, a five-time All-American and a 2008 Pac-12 All-Academic selection, competed at UCLA from 2006-08. As a freshman, she scored a perfect 10 on vault and was runner-up on vault at the NCAA Championships. In 2008, she won the balance beam title at the NCAA Southeast Regionals and was second on uneven bars at the NCAA Championships. Injuries forced her to retire from competition at the start of her senior year in 2009, and Comforte moved into an undergraduate assistant coach role. In 2010, she helped guide the Bruins to a NCAA title.

Following her graduation in 2010, Comforte worked at CAA Sports in Chicago for three years and then returned to gymnastics as the head coach at TAG USA Gymnastics in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. She was an assistant coach at the University of Illinois in 2017, serving as the team's main vault and floor coach and primary choreographer. That season, Comforte helped coach the Illini to the second-highest floor score in school history (49.450). She coached Level 7-10s on floor and vault at Illinois Gymnastics Institute from 2018-19.

Comforte holds a Bachelor's Degree in Sociology and completed her Master's Degree in Organizational Leadership from The Chicago School of Professional Psychology in 2018.