Laurie Hernandez's cha-cha shows why she's a 'Dancing With the Stars' frontrunner

Rio Olympic darling Laurie Hernandez has long been considered the odds-on favorite to win Season 23 of reality TV show "Dancing With the Stars."

And despite an (unwarranted) drama-filled season premiere on Monday, the gold- and silver-medal winning gymnast proved why she was the front-runner to win the coveted Mirrorball trophy with this fantastic cha-cha with pro partner Val Chmerkovskiy, set to Bonnie McKee's "American Girl":

In addition to being a human sparkle, Hernandez impressed the judges with a sharp, clean, glitterbomb of a routine that had judge Julianne Hough calling her "the total package," and Bruno Tonioli declaring that the 16-year-old has "everything at your disposal to be right up there with the best we've ever had."

Hernandez and Chmerkovskiy earned a 31 out of 40 for the routine, tying them with race car driver James Hinchcliffe and Sharna Burgess atop the leaderboard going into Week 2.