Carly's Gymnastics

Because I need to do a lot of catching up I figured every few nights I'd post about things I should have posted a long time ago. 

Carly was asked to join the East Ridge Xcel bronze/ silver team in August of 2015. She has done gymnastics since we moved here, but it was rec level and just once a week. She moved up as far as she could go with the rec team, and they had just formed this team at the High School. To say she was thrilled is an understatement, she was so nervous about her evaluations and couldn't even contain her excitement when she got her letter and award. 

She started going 3 days a week, 2 days were 3 hours and the 3rd day was 2 hours, it was a huge commitment for all of us. She missed a lot of time to hang out with friends, but she never ever complained. There were times we had her skip so she could go to a friends party or sometimes it just seemed like she could use a night off. Her team was brand new, her coaches were new, and they were starting from scratch. In October she started complaining of back pain, she had been working on her back walkover on the beam. I thought she must have tweaked it, but the pain was getting worse and after all the stuff with Ashlee I decided I better get her in to the doctor sooner rather than later. The doctor sent us to the children's hospital for x rays with a spine specialist. They were worried she had fractured her spine, but what they found is almost funny. She is missing a joint between 2 of her vertebrae, so her bones are hitting against each other doing the back walkover- there's not joint to help the spine bend and protect them. She had to quit doing all back walkovers for the rest of the season. Her coach had her do handstands on the beam instead for the competitions.

 Her first competition was December 18, a day after she turned 11- which put her competing in the 11 year old group. I was so incredibly nervous for her. It's a big change to go from doing a sport for fun, to doing it at a competition where they judge you. 

She was having so much fun and didn't care about her scores at all, until awards ceremony and she realized how good the others were. She ended up placing 6th over all in floor in her age group, and she was so excited. After that she decided she wanted to do better, now that she knew what to expect at the competitions. We were thrilled with how she did, with only 4 months to learn and prepare for this meet, we thought she did great. She also had just learned her round off back handspring on the floor the week before, so we were happy for her.

The next meets she progressively got better, and won more and more medals and ribbons. These next pictures are a combo of her next 3 meets.

 She placed 5th in every event except floor, and she also placed 5th over all in her age group at this meet.

She qualified for the State competition, and was super excited. She did well, but was a little bummed at some of her scores. It's hard to work so hard at something and forget to point your toe and get huge deductions for it- but she still did well enough to qualify for Regionals.

Carly was really nervous for Regionals, but again- she did great. She realized there is always more she can improve on and that she has a lot of tough people to compete against- but she loves it! She also got her personal best score on floor, which was huge because she has a hard time keeping straight elbows and knees on her round off back handspring.

I can't remember what she placed to get her medal (I know that's terrible), but there were over 100 girls in her age division, and her overall score put her in 19th place. 

We asked her if she wanted to take a break, we were worried she was a little burned out. She looked at Darrell and I like we were crazy- she did not want a break. She has become very close to her teammates, and her coaches. Her assistant coach Mur- who was very strict and made Carly cry many many times, just moved to California. Carly cried for many days- she said she didn't realize how much she liked her and liked how hard she pushed her. So, this summer she will go to gymnastics 4 days a week, for 3 hours a day. I am totally cringing at this because anything my kids are committed to means my time is committed also, but I know she will love it!