On Saturday, Jan. 6, the Lake Central Gymnastics team competed their first meet of the season at the Valparaiso Vikings Pairs Invitational. The girls competed in beam, floor, vault and bars against Valparaiso, Elkhart Central, Logansport, McCutcheon and Plymouth high schools.
“Today’s meet actually went pretty well for LC’s first meet. We had overall round scores higher than 8.0, which is really nice for the first meet,” Zachary Tobin (10), gymnastics team manager, said.
They ended up placing in third out of five other schools, and for it being their first meet of the season, they did pretty well.
“I am very pleased with how they did. It was a good start to the season,” Coach Karen Barcelli said.
The girls have been preparing and practicing in their new gymnastics area located in one of Lake Central’s gym. Along with their regular practices, they also held a “pretend meet” before their big day of competing.
“We’ve been practicing our routines and new skills, and yesterday at practice we did a mock meet and ran through all of our routines,which helped a lot,” Madison O’Drobinak (12) said.
For it being the girls’ first meet of the new season, they had several factors that held them back from competing their ultimate best. All of those factors can be attacked and improved before their next meet.
“They were a bundle of nerves today so we will work through that, and that should get better throughout the year,” Coach Karen Barcelli said.
The gymnastics team’s next meet will be at Portage High School on Jan. 11 at 6 P.M.
