A bit of background info:
My brother does gymnastics (National 7 in Australia), he is 13 and has been doing gym for ages. In Australia how the State/National Competitions work for the MAG (mens artistic gymnastics) in Victoria (the state we live in) is you have 2 Victorian Championship Trials competitions, which is like an eliminative round. These competitions decide 1. who gets through to compete in the Victorian Championships (Top State competition of the year) and 2, it decides who gets into the state team to represent Victoria against the rest of Australia at the Nationals competition.
So anyway, he had been training hard up to the Vic Champs trials, and on the first trials he competed well, and the second trials he didnt do so well. BUT he made it into the Victorian Championships, AND the state team, which meant he was going to nationals.
So, the next comp was the Victorian Champsionships, we all came to watch, both my parents (which is a RARE occasion as they are divorced.. lol), me, and my grandparents and my step mum. And we got there, waited through general warmup, and then my brother had Vault as his first apparatus warm-up. First touch he attempted a Tsukahara vault (if that means anything to anyone).. he landed funny, completely sprained his ankle and couldnt walk, so therefore he couldnt compete. We went to the gymnastics specialist physio the next day and he said that he had badly damaged 1.5 out of the 3 ligaments in the ankle, which is technically a 6 week injury. But the nationals that he was competing in were in FOUR weeks, and he had to train for them.
SO.. the physio put him on a super intense recovery treatment program, which did help a lot, but i heard some of it was quite painful! And in the end, he gradually built up his strength and was able to compete! although he hadnt practiced his full floor routine at all until the day before he competed.
So anyway! It was yesterday that he competed in the teams day, and he got 1st out of Victoria, and 14th overall, which i think was pretty good! and right this very minute he will be competing for the All Around and apparatus individuals finals.
So here are some photos of him competing yesterday, i will probably add more when we get them from todays comp:
Handspring on floor:
Handstand on floor:
Midway through a backsault:
Either a high L-hold or a low V-hold:
Straddle hold (I don't know what this is really called):
Midway through scissors on pommel (his WORST apparatus by far!):
Lining up at the judges table:
Just after dismounting:
Long kip:
I forget what this is called, but its part of a swing!:
Fixing the P-bars:
This board is a bit dead, so hopefully you can enjoy some more pics to add.
Ok.. update.. he just called home, and apparantly he competed ok, but he wasn't at all happy with it. Still he got either 7th or 8th.. (we arent sure if thats overall or an apparatus though), and we are happy with that! And he got a compulsary upgrade to the next level.
