Trouble at Top and A Star is Born

in the space of a week.

It started when Abbie, the mid-section of the Grade 4 Trio injured her foot and was unable to compete in the Club Competition last week. Everybody thought she might have broken it (though she wasn't sure how, which is odd): it was really painful and swollen. Euh.

We assumed that this would rule the Trio out of the Nationals (yesterday), so everyone was down in the mouth, like. A bit of relief was provided by Lauren Baines and Emily Kolk (the survivors) presenting spectacular pair routine at the Club Comp that they'd cooked up the evening before.

On top of this, Daisy Dailly, top half of the Grade 4 Women's Pair became unwell. They did the Club Competition, but looked a bit shaky and neither she nor Sarah were very happy about tackling the Nationals.

Then somebody suggested that Emily could replace Daisy as Sarah's Top. It seemed a long shot, but at Lilleshall after the Club Comp (it was a really long day!) they set to work and Daisy taught Emily her routines. In the space of five days and an evening, she had to learn two Grade 4 routines with all the balances and acrobatic moves - normally a six-month job.

During the week, Abbie recovered, and was sore but more or less functional by the Saturday morning.

Saturday, 19th May: NDP National Finals.

Preliminary Report

Three groups represented Stafford Acrobatic Gynmnastics Club: Grade 2 Women's Pair, Jenny Wilson and Daisy Stanier; Grade 4 Women's Pair, Sarah Mander-James and Emily Kolk (for Daisy Dailly), and Grade 4 Women's Group, Lauren Baines, Abbie Callow and Emily Kolk.

The competition throughout was tough and the standard very high. Jenny and Daisy presented an excellent routine and although they didn't manage a medal this time, they can be satisfied with a job well-done. They finished (we think) in about the middle of the competition.

The Trio, with Abbie not fully recovered from her injury, performed brilliantly. Their Static routine was pretty much flawless and looked polished and accomplished, though the dymanic routine suffered with a couple of tentative moments. Unfortunately that was enough to take them well out of the medals.

Sarah and Emily won their competition - a truly awesome achievement! To go from scratch to winning a National Final at Grade 4 in less than a week is something I've never heard of before. It's also worth mentioning that it's the first year that Emily has worked at this level (last year - you may remember - she won a Bronze at Grade 2 with Jen and Chelsie; so that's four national finals in two years, with top three positions in two of them).

Unfortunately, British Gymnastics in their unimpeachable wisdom didn't see it that way. At lower Grades, you are allowed to compete in more than one event - it's quite common - at at Grade 4 you can only do one. So because Emily was on the card to compete in the Women's Group event, they didn't recognise the Pair, though they allowed them to compete as 'guests'.

While it's true that we knew this before they arrived, I don't think anybody seriously thought that they would be competitive. As it turned out, BG's ruling is unfair at so many levels. It doesn't recognise Emily's astonishing achievement, or Sarah's (who has put in months of hard work). And the Pair who came second and were awarded Gold must feel pretty choked too.

Soon (a couple of weeks, I guess) we should have some pictures, maybe some video and some actual scores.

Steve