Glenn's News Corner
Bicester had a good result at the Oxfordshire county Championships with Jess Pitts placing 2nd in the OOA Level 3, Amy Deller placing 3rd and Chloe Banks 4th. In the OOA Level 4 Junior we had Amy Chapman place 3rd and at Level 4 Senior Annabelle Clifton placed 4th. All qualifing for the Southern Regional Finals on July 11th.
The girls were all happy to get into the finals but were not really expecting to manage scores high enough to earn a place on the podium. The extra training prior to the final paid off. Amy Champman placed 3rd for her Beam winning a bronze medal. Annabelle placed 3rd for her beam at level 4 senior also winning a bronze. Jess was on and off the beam 4 times so gave up her chances of a medal on beam but performed her 1/2 on 1/2 off vault with little deductions earning her 3rd place and a bronze medal.
Yvette and Maya took Rushani Arumugham, Kitty Holt, Amy Gould and Alice Walder to Carterton Gymnastics Club on Saturday 26th June for their first 8 and Under County League Competition. The girls made up two teams competing against Cartertons teams. Rushani and Kitty placed 2nd for their Range and Conditioning and Amy and Alice placed 3rd for their Flatback Vaults. They will be competing in the last of this years league on 13th November.
Glenn took 4 of the clubs Advanced Recreational gymnasts to this years Annual Arabian Gymnastics Club's Roses invitational at Milton Keynes. Again we were unsure what the competition was going to be like and were not expecting the results we got, 13 medals. Lea McLaughlin was true to form and performed better in the competition than she does at trainingn and hauled in the medals. Glenn jokingly advised that she probably needed to call for an Armoured truck to take her home. Lea won 4 Golds and a Silver. Katie Midson did well winning 1 Silver and 3 Bronze medals. Tammy Burdett won a Gold and a Silver and last but not least Emily Whiteley won a Silver and a Bronze. Fantastic results!
It was a very busy weekend for Amy Deller. On Saturday Amy was involved in two seperate competitions. Amy was part of her school's team at the National Schools Competition up in Stoke-on-Trent in the morning and then back down to Wade gymnastics club for another schools competition in the afternoon.
Mother's Day was the most important competition as she was taking part in the National Club grades down at Basingstoke. Amy was attempting to pass her Grade 8, which I can report that she was successful at doing. I think she could have done better but with the 2 competitions the day before and having a bit of a cold and sore throat, I think she was a bit worn down. I wish the judges had been judging her warm-ups as they were actually better than the routines that counted. I witnessed what I think was her best Bar routine but sadly it was the warm-up. On beam she displayed an unusual mount in her warm-up doing a sort of neck stand while falling out of her failed straddle balance to japanna. She actually was performing quite well until she came off the beam from her cartwheel, which she hasn,t done for sometime now losing a whole point. An eventfull morning but a successful one as Amy needed a score of 45 to pass and scored 48.5 therefore a PASS!
All 7 gymnasts pass their relevant grade. Orlaith Lyford and Amy Aston both did exceptionally well achieving Distinctions. Orlaith and Tessa McCormack both automatically qualified for the Southern Region finals on April 11th. Amy Aston has also has earned the right to compete in the Southern Region finals with her final score. Well done to Tobi Stevens, Christy Llewellyn, Tessa Mccormack, Olivia Stock, Orlaith Lyford and Amy Aston for passing Grade 14. Well done to Emily Harris for passing Grade 12.
What a FANTASTIC day! Well done to all the gymnasts!
I saw a lot of very nice, tidy routines from both the Recreational level, Development level and Squads. As I had to judge due to two judges not showing I could not watch everybody but the ones I did see, I was very impressed and saw many gymnasts giving it their all and impressing their coaches.
I was judging Bars most of the time and I was really impressed by some of the routines I saw. They were nothing like what I have been seeing in training. I'm sure Daisy will agree that her "Shushunovas" performed exceptionally well with Zoe and Lea executing fantastic dismounts.
I think our new Squad Club Champion, Annabelle Clifton, deserves a 'Big Well Done' as she was actually quite ill being physically sick prior to competing.
Congratulations to Christy Llewellyn our 2010 Recreationl Club Champion. Christy has been working very hard and it goes to show spending time on the basic condiditoning pays off.
I would like to thank Richard Cadle for all the work he has put into our three young men. I can not always be there with them and Richard has done a fantastic job trying to motivate the lads. I know how difficult that can be. Well done Toby Webber who is showing great potential with the limited boys apparatus the club has. Toby has only just recently learnt his tuck back dismount off the bars and performed this exceptionally well. He is not a very tall lad and the Vault is almost as tall has him but he flew over like it was nothing. Toby definitly earned his place as Boys 2010 Champion getting Gold on all four apparatus and scoring the hightest recreational Floor and Vault scores combined winning the Upton Shield.
One Area Maya has put a lot of time stressing the importance of is the Range and Conditioning sets for the Development and full Squads. Dawne Cole was asked to be firm judging the R&Cs and had some very good comments after the competition about many of the younger development gymnasts. Most of their scores were over 10.20 out of 13.50Amy Aston won the Range & #Conditioning Trophy with an impressive score of 11.50. There was only one Squad gymnast, Leah Plant, who scored above 10.00 and she has been suffering with a bad knee for some time now and deserves recognition for her of 10.20 and gold for her level. The squads had to perform the National Grade 8 - 5 Range and conditioning set which is quite difficult so although not getting above 10pts Gemma sole needs a mention for her Gold on R&C with a score of 9.90.
Our Development squad 2010 Champion is now Tessa McCormick who won 3 Golds and 2 Silvers with an overall total of 55.90 Well done Tessa!
Our two Squad groups were competing Grade 11 and Grade 7 of the Natinal Development Plan. The Grade 7 is exceptonally difficult requiring some "scary" moves which the girls have been working very hard on over the past few months. I think the most impressive achievement would have to be from Amy Deller who only last week first managed to do a giant on the wooden A-Bars. She performed her giants unaided for the first time at a competion, sadly the power she got from the giant was more than she could handle when it came to her dismount. It was suppose to be a Straight back but due to the power and her tucking in she over rotated and fell on landing. Amy also performed one of her tidiest floor routines I have seen her do, giving her Gold on Floor. With that Gold and a good Bar score Amy pipped Gemma to 1st place in Grade 7. Gemma Sole has been stuggling to get back in form after have two seperate injuries last year but won 3 Golds and a Silver and placed 2nd in Grade 7. I think I need to mention Jess Pitts also, at Grade 7 who came 3rd for all her effort. Jess won 1 Gold on Bars with and impressive 11.80 and 2 Silver medals.
Our Grade 11 squad group was not without it's personal best, as mentioned above Annabelle Clifton after purging all in the morning amanaged to win 2 Golds and 3 Silvers and become the Squad Champion 2010. One girls who I know was very proud of her personal achievement on the day was Katie Harris who has been struggling to get that elusive "upstart" finally managed to do a lovely upstart and with straight arms. Well Done to her!
I am not even going to start trying to list all the medal winners of the day here as it would take me as long to write it as it did to give them all out. I will try to get them posted on the site later. I do have one other mention which is a very sought ofter Trophy, "The John Goodgame Trophy". This is awared to a gymnast, which could be either from the Recreational or Squad groups, who may not be the best but who always shows up for training, never complains when asked to do conditioning, has a good attitude to her training, who helps put out equipment and also helps encourage her peers. This year it was decided this trophy should go to...Drum roll....Olivia Stock. Keep up the hard work and good attitude.
There are always going to be disappointments and a few falls and routines that just don't work on the day, but this is all part of life and we all have to learn to deal with it. This is why gymnastics is so good for our youngsters, it helps to develop individual confidence and character that can be use in other areas of thier life.
A big thank you to Maya for all the precomp work that she did making up the groups and routines. Also, to all of the coaches for there hard work getting their groups ready and to our committee for all behind the scene work envolved. >
Congradulations to Rosanna Mills, Gemma Sole, Morgan Broom, Georgie Long and Richard Cadle who all obtained their Certification for the British Gymnastics, UKCCLevel 0 Proficiency Award Scheme Coaching.
This course was a 6 hour course run by Alan 'Paddy' Lavell from Andover Gymnastics Club. It was a very relaxed and fun course enjoyed by all. I would like to express my sincere thanks to all the young gymnast who came to help our new coaches.
Tabitha Saltzer, age 10, dud not have a good start to the competition. Suffering a bad case of nerves and then finding out that I could not be standing by the beam when she attempeted her Flic added to her stress. Tabitha managed the flic in warm-up but missed her hand placement during the 'real thing' and came off quite dramatically. She got back up in tears which didn't help her forward roll and she was off again losing another valuable 1.0 pt. Glenn tried his best to get her spirits lifted for the rest of the competition telling her she had to put the beam in the past and get on with her floor to the best of her ability. This is exactly what she did and scored a repectable 11.7 putting her just 0.2 behind the Gold medal winner from AGA. Silver for Tabitha and Oxfordshire Gymnastics Association.
Later in the day, the 3 girls competing at level 3 were on. The competition was of very high standard with some impressive skills from the 87 gymnasts from 20 clubs out of the Southern Region. All three, Amy Deller, Jess Pitts and Georgie Long were extremely nervous. This did not help and Jess was off the Beam 3 times and found it hard to lift herself up for the rest of the competition. Jess did anage to place 5th on both beam and floor. Amy who was suffering the week before with a torn thigh muscle managed to perform quite well and placed 4th on level 3 Junior Floor. I think Georgie was giving it her very best knowing that she didn't have all the skills in her routines to score up with the rest of the gymnasts. Georgie placed 4th on both beam and floor and scored 12.00 pts for her vault winning her the Silver medal, which Glenn had to point out to the organizers that they had missed calling her to the podium.
Leah Plant was the youngest from our club competing level 4 Junior. Although Leah didn't place on any of the pieces she did improve on her scores from the county competition and is going in the right direction for next year. Well done to all the girls not only for their efforts Sunday but for getting to Southern Region Finials.
Well done to all for achieving success at the county grade 14 - 9
competition on Sunday 22nd March 2009. After months of practising
and honing the skills required Abbi Durrant passed her Grade 13
with a score of 55.20 and placing 4th. She needed to score above
52.00 to go through to the Regional Finals. The score to reach in
grades 12 - 9 was 42.00. Competing at grade 12 were Katie Harris
who scored 43.35 and Leah Plant who scored 42.80 earning both a
place at the Regional Finals and placing 4th and 5th
respectively. Competing at grade 9, Amy Deller scored 42.85
placing 2nd and also earned a place at the Regional Finals.
Although all four qualified for the Regional Finals, coaches and
gymnasts have decided not to enter and concentrate preparing for
the county full apparatus championships later this year on May
17th.
Thank you to Becca and Maya for all the time and effort preparing
Abbi, Katie and Leah for this competition. I would also like to
thank Angela and Susan for helping me prepare Amy.
