Suddenly, the Mountain Shadows girls gymnastics team is in full competitive mode. After a few meets in St. Albert, Airdrie and Red Deer, the team is in full preparation for the upcoming Trials to Westerns and Zone Championships in late March.
Attending the Great West Gym Fest in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, a meet that boasts 900 female competitors, 47 clubs, seven senior Mountain Shadows gymnasts competed with 16-year-old Lauren Lavoie qualifying for the “Big Show Finals”. The “Big Show Finals” which are held in the Coeur d’Alene Resort ballroom under flashing lights, with a live band and visiting Olympians feature the top six gymnasts in each event with over 2,000 spectators. Despite not hitting her best vault, Lauren finished a respectable fourth.
On a busy weekend, Lauren went 3rd AA in her US rules competition, 3rd AA in the Canadian rules competition along with winning gold for vault in that session.
Other girls were very active also at this meet, as Shannon McIntosh of High River barely missed vault finals in the American rules section but rebounded the next morning with wins in beam and vault and an AA in the Canadian competition.
Also finishing with ribbons in the US competition were Danika Gibbs, Alanah Harrison and Elektra Taylor with Danika finishing 3rd AA in the Canadian competition and Elektra winning beam and Alanah winning floor over all the Canadian clubs present.
Competing along with Lauren in the advanced US Level 9 group were Nicole Lavoie and Kelly Krich. The Great West Gym Fest which is billed as one of the United States’ largest meets draws clubs from all over Western US and several parts of Canada and this year featured the regular competition under US rules but also ran a session under Canadian rules to accommodate all their northern visitors.
On the same weekend, younger Mountain Shadows gymnasts were in Medicine Hat and came up with the following top eight placements:
Pre-Argo 2003 – Haleigh Todd 4th AA, Brooklynn Dunn 5th AA, Kiara Newhook 6th AA.
Pre-Argo 2002 - Sydni Paish 2nd AA.
Argo 2002 – Callie Zacharias 1st AA, Rachel Shortridge 4th AA, Emilie Dionne 7th AA, Taylor Friesen 8th AA.
P1 Argo – Aidan Doyle 5th AA.
P2 Tyro – Kylee Rude 1st AA, Jayda Newhook 4th AA.
P2 Novice – Victoria Paish 6th AA.
Mountain Shadows gymnasts now travel to Cranbrook, BC and to the Altadore meet in Calgary before settling in for the major meets at the end of the month.
