Gymnasts from the Paradigm Sports Academy in Mitchells Plain are getting ready to show off their skills at the Western Cape Championships next month in Saldanha after bagging five gold, four silver and three bronze medals at the Women's Artistic Gymnastics District Trials for Level 1-3.
The trials were held at the Western Cape Sports School and 12 gymnasts from the academy walked away as overall winners.
Ruquiyah Pietersen from Paradigm says girls between the ages of 8-13 competed.
“This is the first time all of our girls have qualified for Western Cape Championships. They are very excited as it is the first time the majority of them are doing gymnastics.
”Coming from Mitchells Plain it is a very big deal as we do not get much recognition and gymnastics is an expensive sport so the parents have a lot to fork out.”
The Western Cape champs will take place from 7-9 June and all 12 girls will compete again in hopes of qualifying for SA Gym Games.
“We are looking forward to it, our girls always do well and win medals. Last year we competed and two of our girls qualified to go to SA Gym Games but they could not attend due to funding because we had to pay for the trip out of our own pockets.”
“When we compete, we never speak about medals or encourage them to just think about winning, we just tell the girls to have fun and not stress about the competition and it works for us.
“Our main focus for the next couple of days is to pay attention to the finer details to get higher scores for next month’s competition and just have fun.”
marsha.dean@inl.co.za