Spirit of the Flame . . .

This is the meet that Zi has been waiting all season for--of course the main reason was because they give leos instead of t-shirts!

Spirit was definitely a different experience--the meet was huge, essentially running three sessions all at the same time in the same room.  It was also a bit further away than most of our meets and involved teams from out-of-state and a team from Canada.  :)

Due to some flooding and road closures earlier in the week, we left about an hour earlier than originally planned.  Luckily the extra time wasn't needed and the drive went well.  While normally we would find a Starbucks to use as a changing room, I knew the local Starbucks did not have a bathroom (or easy parking) and wasn't sure where to change.  Thanks to my very tinted windows, Zi suggested changing in the car--which she did.  :)  We were able to get into the venue a little early, look around and stake out good seating for our session.  I'm glad I did (and saved seats) because some of the other parents had found seats that would not have provided a good vantage point.

For the first time this season, we didn't start on beam!  Instead it was floor, one of Zi's best events.  I think because of the size of the building and that there were three sessions happening, I almost couldn't hear Zi's music.  She was able to, however, and her routine looked good.  A wobble after her 1 1/2 turn and her leap was a bit low, but otherwise it looked good.  She scored a 9.325--which earned her 5th place.

Vault was next.  She's been a little off on vault the last couple of meets.  After warm-up, her coach texted me and said that she's doing better and looking good again.  I thought she looked great other than a step on her landing, and she scored a 9.075, much better than her last two meets where she didn't get a 9.  This gave her 9th place, which was below the medal rankings.

Bars--I was so nervous.  The last two meets she has fallen and I wasn't sure how it was going to go.  During warm-up, she went over on her cast to handstand and that made me wonder really how she was going to do.  I shouldn't have worried, she had her best score of the season, 9.400 and tied for first place!

Final event was beam--weird that we have normally started on beam and now we ended on it.  This is definitely Zi's weakest event, but she has been getting stronger.  I noticed that her split jump was low and barely split--luckily it was split enough to count, but barely.  She scored a 9.175, which gave her 7th place.

Her All-Around score was 36.975, her highest yet and she got a third place finish!  The girl who took first place was from Canada, so not someone that she will compete against at States.

The team did well and took third place--without one of our girls competing.  This is their third team award this season.  So proud of all of them.

Our next meet is on Friday--another day missing from school.  We will be leaving right after practice on Thursday night and sleeping near the venue.  Wish us luck!

Roseville Invitational

I feel like I'm always writing the same things here.  We practice, go to a meet, do well and practice again.  I can only use the same modifiers so many times without sounding like a broken record, but here goes!  😉

The Roseville Invitational was held on Saturday for our Level 6 girls.  We had to be there by 1:00 and the entire drive I was thinking that we were late, that I was going to get a call from the coach asking where we were, but luckily that didn't happen.  It did happen to a girl on another team, but she was delayed due to traffic and weather--arriving just as warm-up ended.

Again our girls started on beam.  That has been their starting event at every meet so far this season.  Z did well, a few wobbles, but no falls and scored a 9.100.  Not a bad score, and a 7th place finish.

On floor, Z had a pretty big step after her 1 1/2 turn, but still earned a 9.350. It was funny because we had the same judges on floor as at Sweetheart and Z scored 0.050 higher, but she thought her routine was much better.  She was a bit frustrated, but in the end took first place!

Vault was fine.  Nothing exciting, a step at the end on both.  During warm-up she stuck a landing, but not during the competition.  She wound up with a 9.050 and third place.

Bars was last.  Her warm-up looked great and after the last meet we were hoping for a clean routine.  Unfortunately, she didn't quite get her squat on, did a monkey swing and unfortunately missed the high bar--her fingers hit, but she wasn't quite tall enough to reach.  The rest of the routine was good and she scored an 8.850.  Better than last time, but still a big deduction--although it was the 2nd highest score on her team.  She finished in 7th place even with the fall.

Her all-around score was 36.350, 0.400 higher than the last meet.  She tied for 4th place, but there was also a tie for 2nd place, so she really had the third highest all around score.  She was very happy with the additional 5 medals to add to her collection.

The team took third place and received a nice trophy instead of the traditional banner.

This was a weird meet for me--the only score board was on the far side of the gym, near the floor and was difficult to read and blurry.  Also, most of the time you couldn't see it because girls were standing in front of it.  Normally I can check the scores on meetscoresonline.com, however, for some reason after our third girl was on bars, it stopped working/updating.  I never saw Z's bar score and ultimately had to ask her coach what it was.  Also, I normally know what places Z gets before awards, but again, because it hadn't updated, I didn't find out until she did.  Fun in some ways, but also frustrating.

We have another meet this Saturday--Spirit of the Flame.  It is a very big meet held at the San Jose Convention Center.  While it is a bit of a drive, it shouldn't be too bad.  Z is happy because this meet gives out leos instead of t-shirts!  (Roseville gave out sling-bags instead of t-shirts.)

Sweetheart Invitational

Well, we have our second official optional meet under our belts.  There were highs and there were lows, but we definitely know where we are going.

This week was a bit odd because Z had a week-long science camp with her school to attend.  As such, she missed three days of practice this week.  It would have been four, but I picked her up on Thursday from camp, took her to practice and then back to camp in time for bed.  I could tell watching her practice both Thursday and Friday that she was tired and tired quickly during practices.  In hindsight, her father thinks we shouldn't have let her go to camp, but I was not about to take that opportunity away from her.

While we were getting ready on Saturday morning, I asked Z what event she wanted to start on and she said beam.  I figured it was because it is her weakest event and she wanted to get it out of the way.  Well, she got her wish--beam was up first.  Her warm up looked good and so did her routine.  We were more than excited when her score flashed as a 9.425.  This is her highest beam score ever--she had only scored a 9 twice before, a 9.100 at level 3 and a 9.000 at level 5 states--so this was a big deal. Although this was the highest score for quite a while, she wound up in 3rd place.

Floor was up next and I did see a few bobbles, but her score was still a 9.300, which is good in my book.  This wound up as 5th place.

Vault is normally a no-brainer for Z and she almost always scores over a 9.000.  But not this time.  Her score was an 8.675, which I was confused about but her coach indicated that he agreed with the score.  I'm not going to question him since he is a level 9 judge.

Bars was last--what has become one of her best events.  Warm-up looked really good, although she was not really making her monkey swing, so it looked like she was just going to do a squat-on.  I watched her start her routine and she looked amazing.  After the squat on and jump to high bar, she did her kip and then a really large cast to do her lay-out fly-away dismount.  Unfortunately, she went big and completely over-rotated her fly-away and landed on her back.  This caused a reduction in her start value, along with the fall and other deductions.  She scored an 8.550, but her coach said she had 1.300 in deductions, which means she would have potentially had a 9.850.

Her all-around score was a 35.950, enough for 8th place, with no medals on vault or bars.  She was very upset and frustrated at herself, but I was able to remind her that even her "bad" day, gave her an all around score that is in the top half of those she had gotten in the past, and was better than some girls on a "good" day.

We know she has the potential to do really well, she has shown it in the past and I know she will do well this weekend.  We have a full week of practice and a private on Wednesday.  I'm thinking things will be just fine.

Flips Invitational

Well, the first official Level 6 meet is in the books!  While this meet does not qualify Z for States, because it is an out-of-state meet, it does give her an idea of what she can do and whether she might qualify at her next meet on February 4th.

Not only was this an out-of-state meet, it was one that occurred on a Friday, which meant taking a day off school.  We did advise Z's teachers before hand and since a test was scheduled for Friday, Z went in early on Thursday to take the test.  Due to stupid rules/laws, even though we were taking her out for a reason, it is deemed an unexcused absence--I guess sports don't count as excused unless they are school related.

The other problem that we were having was getting to the meet.  Normally it is about a 3 1/2 hour drive, but we are dealing with some extreme weather and getting to Reno, over mountain roads, involves snow and possibly chains.  While we had agreed to carpool with another teammate and her coach, with the other father driving, he was unable to find chains for his car, so I ended up driving.  Luckily, although we did buy chains, we found out that our AWD vehicle has tires rated for snow and mud and we ended up not needing the chains.  The drive took about 4 1/2 hours, with some of that spent behind snow plows, but really wasn't too bad.  I was actually glad that we were carpooling or else Z would have become very bored and it would have been a miserable trip.

Once we got to the venue, we checked into our hotel room and set about getting prepared.  I had done the front of Z's hair the night before, so all that was left was the braid bun and getting dressed.  We had about two hours, but finished early and headed down to the area where the meet was being held.

This place was HUGE!  All of the equipment looked new and there really wasn't a bad viewing area in the place.  As parents, we all staked out our seats and then ushered the girls to the coach.  Unfortunately, we only had three of our five level 6 girls--one had been really sick and one couldn't make it as her father didn't have chains.  In hindsight, I should have offered to let her come with us.

Our first event was beam.  Since it is Z's weakest event, I'm always happy when they do beam first as it gets it out of the way.  Although she had a huge bobble at one point, and I honestly thought she might fall, she scored an 8.950.  Considering her best beam score in Level 5 was a 9.000, I was happy.  It did ultimately get her 5th place on the event.

Floor was next.  This has always been one of Z's favorite events and I love her routine.  Her warm-up seemed to go well, although during open warm up she fell on her front tuck.  I shouldn't have worried, however, as she performed beautifully.  Unfortunately, I hit the wrong button on my phone and instead of video, I have a great shot of her walking off the floor when her routine was over.  :(  She did score a 9.500, which not only was first place in her age group, but was the highest score of all the Level 6 competitors.

Vault was fairly typical.  Her warm up was so-so, but when she actually performed she did great.  On her second vault, which was probably her best one, it looked like she was really going to stick her landing, but she ended up taking a step back.  It looked unnecessary, and her coach teased her about it when she was done.  She scored a 9.250, earning a third place medal.

Bars was last.  Bars has quickly become one of Z's strongest events.  She now has her cast to handstand and her routine at the in-house meet was great.  During warm-up she over-shot the handstand and fell forward, but did another one and was fine.  When she was competing, she did a monkey-swing after her squat on, something she doesn't normally do, but she didn't fall and other than a small step on her landing, her routine looked clean.  She scored a 9.175, which was second place.

Z's all around score was a 36.875, which earned her second place in her age group.  It was also the third highest score of the Level 6 session.  I was so proud of her.  This was definitely a strong start to her season.

After the meet, her coach told us that the judge who was on floor was very critical and being able to get a 9.500 from her really meant something.  He also indicated that all of the judges at the meet were the highest ranking judges, so they have been doing this for a LONG time.

When we got home, we also found out that Z now has her team record for the highest bar score in Level 6.  And she is only off the top floor score by 0.025.  I can only see these getting better as she moves on this season.

Next week will be interesting.  It is the week before a competition, but her class has science camp all week.  I think we are going to bring her home on Thursday afternoon so that she can get two nights of practice in before her meet.

Optional Season Begins . . .

Z's first official optional meet is this weekend.  We are travelling out of state and she gets to miss a day of school since she competes on Friday.  I'm not worried since she is a straight-A student and gets all her homework done ahead of time.

The past couple of months (since States) have been a little strange.  Our team has grown tremendously due to the closing of another local team.  As a result, we have now been carpooling a couple of nights a week and I don't get to watch Z practice as often as I used to.  That means there are times when I come to watch and she is doing skills that I didn't know that she could do!

Last week we had an in-house meet with a judge to allow the girls who have never competed optionals a chance to see what it is like.  The judge who came was the bars judge at the Level 5 State meet in November, plus we have seen her at other meets.  The benefit to having a coach who is also a judge is the connections to bring someone like this to the gym for us.  The nice thing about this being an in-house meet was the  judge gave a lot of feedback following each event.  The girls were not given their score cards until after the judge left, but Z did really well.

The meet was held as an official meet would be.  The girls wore their competition leos and warm ups.  We started on vault, as we decided to do the traditional Olympic rotation--it also made it easier since there was still practice for the compulsory girls and recreation classes going on.  Z has been fairly consistent on vault and this proved no different.  The Level 6 vault is the same as the Level 5 vault, so nothing had changed.  She scored a 9.35.

On bars, the routines are all different.  Each girl doing her own routine with some similar skills.  This was the first time that I had seen Z's full routine.  To say I was impressed that she is now doing a kip, cast to handstand is an understatement.  Her routine was clean and she scored a 9.40.

Beam was next.  I was nervous about beam because this has always been her weakest event.  Although she has been working on her back handspring, her coach has her doing a cartwheel instead.  She is more consistent and normally doesn't fall. Her routine is cute and she smiled a lot.  She scored a 9.10

Finally we had floor.  This has normally been a strong event for Z.  Her routine is great, although to me there are some slow spots.  But she loves her music and has been working hard on this.  Her coach did the choreography over a couple of weeks of privates, but hers was one of the first one finished.  As such, she has had more time to perfect her routine.  And, it showed.  She was given a 9.60 on floor.

Her all-around score was a 37.45.  This is the highest she has scored at any meet.  Although she seems to think it isn't as important since the meet was at home, I did remind her that this was a "real" judge who was watching and giving the scores.  The judge told her that her choreography is good, and that she is great with the emotion and smiling.  She does need to work on her toe point and her split leaps, but she is doing well.

After practice was over, the other girls (compulsory team) were coming off the floor and as Z gave me her score card they were saying that "Z won."  Apparently she had the highest all around score of the Level 6 girls.  Although she will never compete directly against them since they are all at least 3 years older, it was still nice to see.

Fingers crossed that she keeps her momentum and does well on Friday.  :)

Level 5 States!!!

I cannot believe that I forgot to post about the Level 5 State meet.  It was the week after Halloween Jamboree and so much has happened since then in our lives, that I guess it slipped my mind.

The State meet was held at the same gym as the Halloween Jamboree.  It was a little different in that they were using both sets of equipment and little Z was on the set that she did not use the week before.  The nice thing about this meet is that one of her old teammates is now at the gym where the meet was held. She ended up walking in Z's group and being able to talk to Z between events.  It was nice to see them together and for them to be able to catch up.  The other great thing about this is that Z's dad was able to come watch--it is the first State meet that he has been to.

Beam was first.  I'm always nervous with beam, but she did well.  She wound up with a 9.000.

Floor was second.  This has typically been Z's best event and she did not disappoint.  She scored a 9.375, one of her personal bests.  But there were some high scores and even with a 9.375, she wound up in 4th place.

Vault was up next.  She typically does pretty well on vault, but during warm up things just looked off.  She wasn't getting much push off the vault table and on one practice vault she actually hit her back on the edge of the table.  I was really worried about how she was going to do.  But once again, she pulled it out and scored a 9.225.  Not as high as she has done in the past, but much better than I expected based upon her warm up.  This was enough for 6th place.

Her last event was bars.  Although her year started out poorly on bars due to her dismount, she has really pulled it out after changing to a lay-out fly away.  She got up and did great--her casts were high (one so high she said that she almost scared herself) and scored a 9.300.  This was enough for 2nd place.  Her coach thought the score was a little low, but we were happy.

For All-Around she scored a 36.900--her second highest all-around score and 5th place.  It was weird to see that only one-tenth of a point separated 2nd from 5th place.  She was sooo close to second place.  And, once again, had she been competing with her older teammate, she would have placed 1st all-around since she scored higher than her teammate.

Overall, we were really happy with her results.  She scored at least a 9.000  on every event--a first for her.

Now we are on to Optionals.  Her first meet will be January 20-22, however, we are going to have an intersquad meet on January 13th.  She has all of her routines finished and it is just time to polish them and ensure that she has the skills that she needs for each event.  :)

Halloween Jamboreee

So, Halloween Jamboree was our last meet before States this year.  It's one that the girls love, especially since they get to dress in costume for the march in.   Since we only have two Level 5 girls, they went as Thing 1 and Thing 2 and their coach was Cat in the Hat.  It was really cute!

We started on vault--again I know I'm a broken record, but I love starting on vault.  Z did great scoring a 9.600--a personal best and enough for 3rd place.  Hard to believe that a 9.600 was third, but we couldn't complain at all!

Bars was just awesome.  She scored a 9.525--again another personal best and first place for the meet.  I never would have imagined at the beginning of the season that bars would end up being one of Z's best events.

Beam was good.  She scored an 8.900 and didn't fall!!!  She didn't place, but again proved that she can do the back walkover without falling.

Floor was last and she scored a 9.275, which was good enough for 3rd place.

All around she scored a 37.300--her best ever!!! And 1st place.  The best part about this meet is that her and her teammate had the two highest all around scores of the meet and both took first place in their age divisions.

This was a great last meet of the season, especially since it was at the same gym where States were going to be held.