BY GIANNI UBRIACO
Eighty of the best young gymnasts from around the north will be tumbling their way to the Extreme North Gymnastics Club in Dowling on Saturday, April 28.
The club, which was first started in the Town of Onaping Falls
back in 1970 as purely a recreational program, will be hosting
gymnasts from the Sault YMCA, Petawawa, and the Sudbury
YMCA.
The club's administrator and head coach, Tracey Day, is already
looking forward to the competition and hopes her gymnasts do
well, but believes it'll be about a lot more than just winning
gold medals.
"Success to me means letting these gymnasts be the best they
possibly can be," she says. "Their individual success adds to
it too, but when they're happy with what they've done, it makes
all the difference to us. All we expect them to do is set their
own goals and then we just encourage them."
Even so, the club has had its share of success recently. In
fact, it sent six of its Ontario Developmental Program (ODP)
gymnasts to a competition that was held during February at the
Mariposa Gymnastics Club in Orillia.
Although it was the first time that the club sent any ODP
gymnasts to a competition, Maisse Gionest and Cally Vanier
manoeuvred their way to gold medals, while fellow teammates
Meadow Lacroix, Sophie Godin, Madison Pulvermacher, and Willow
Hilderbrandt vaulted their way to silver medals.
"We did very well considering no other Sudbury club right now
has the ODP since it's mostly only southern Ontario clubs that
do," explains Day. "The reason Gymnastics Ontario has this new
program is that they take the younger age groups who are not
eligible yet for the Ontario Competitive Program (OCP) and they
develop them to become better athletes by enhancing strength,
flexibility, power, and body alignment over skills."
Extreme North also has an ODP for beginners called the Petite
Elites, who will begin competing next year. That brings their
total number of competitive performers to 32. They're led by
head coach Sarrah Day, Tracey's daughter, who recently
completed her Level 3 National Coaching Certification
Program(NCCP). Sarrah started the ODP after working at the
Ottawa Gymnastics Club two years ago. Her mother feels she has
already seen the benefits of being in a big club first-hand in
that it has enabled her to prepare younger gymnast to be
high-calibre athletes.
Considering the fact that the club first started with only
about 60 kids participating on a recreational level, it
certainly has come a long way, especially since it was moved to
Dowling 24 years ago. In fact, the club is now home to 25
athletes who compete in their OCP, which was first started in
1999 after Sudbury was amalgamated and the club was
subsequently forced to change its name from the Onaping Falls
Gymnastics Club to their current status. Those OCP gymnasts
recently returned home from Barrie after successfully competing
on March 16 against 130 young gymnasts from as far away as
Windsor.
Bringing home a first place finish in Level 2 was Amber Mayer,
while teammate Lexie Beauregard settled for fourth, Giulia
Kiernan landed in fifth, and Amelie Martel, Ellen Kiernan, and
Abbi Beauregard all tied for sixth.
Meanwhile, team member Jenelle Goudreau finished fourth in the
Level 5 category, while Celeste Goudreau earned a second place
finish in Level 4.
As for the Level 3 competition, team member Alexie Lavoie
jumped her way to a second place finish, while Sophie Gingras
took third, and Kayla Sagle and Brianna Sagle tied for fourth
just ahead of Tristan Levielle.
All and all, Day was very pleased with the club's
performance.
"We have some great gymnasts here," proclaims Day. "We don't
have any gymnasts yet that compete in the provincial
qualifiers, but we have three provincial girls that we take
into different competitions."
With all this success in their competitive programs, Day still
points out that their recreational program remains strong with
120 members. The program is actually broken down into various
age categories, ranging from one-year-old tots all the way up
to teens and adults. She adds that she's more than satisfied
with their current numbers considering the relatively small
size of Dowling. Plus, she points out that they have all-new
equipment thanks to a Trillium grant they recently received.
However, she does indicate that they don't charge as much as
other clubs, so one of their goals is to find some corporate
sponsors to help cover the rent for the complex they use that's
located at 79 Main St.
Ultimately though, what she believes sets her club apart from
any other is the fact that they focus on having fun and
building their kids' self-esteem.
"We make it personal as we're more of a feel-good club," she
says. "With this club, we really value our recreational kids
and if anyone shows talent and commitment, we invite them to
come to our competitive program. For our competitive program,
we want to build the athlete up to become a better person, to
become confident with themselves, and to be able to perform in
front of a group. It also helps them in public speaking and in
all areas of sports and schooling."
All of the club's recreational and competitive gymnasts, along
with their coaches, will have a chance to showcase their
talents on Sunday, May 27 when they put on a year-end show in
the nearly 4,000 square-foot facility in Dowling.
