More Nerves

The very first track meet of the season is tomorrow. This is also my very first track meet ever. I know it is pretty obvious, but track is TOTALLY different than gymnastics. 

Here are a few of my reasons:

1. I have had practice for two weeks, and about two-thirds of us have no experience with track what-so-ever. With gymnastics, we had about nine months of training before the first meet. 

2. I have no idea what I will be running, along with everyone else. So I will find out at the meet. With gymnastics, you know what you will be competing two weeks in advance, at the very latest.

RUN! (that's me)

3. The coaches don’t know who you are. You could start talking to a coach about something you discussed the day before, and they don’t remember what you are talking about (this happened to me today). With gymnastics, at least with my team, the coaches know you as well as your parents do.

4. The team is HUGE. There are about one-hundred people on the track team, girls and guys. My gymnastics team only had ten people on it, all girls.

5. I am still clueless. I have no idea what the meet is going to be like, and what to do. With gymnastics, I knew every little detail there was to know. 

6. Everybody knows everybody, but not really. We all go to the same school, so I recognize most people on the team, but I don’t actually know them yet. With gymnastics, I knew my teammates so well, it was like they were my sisters.

Luckily, some of my friends on the team will be there so we can be clueless together!

Track and Time

Track is five days a week after school. As I mentioned earlier, I have no idea what I am doing, so today I decided to go with the sprinters. We warmed up inside, then went outside to the track. After running, we did some abs. I know this is weird, but I LOVE ABS. Anyways we had a plank competition. Everyone had to hold plank for thirty seconds, then it was a competition to see who could hold it the longest. I don’t mean to brag or anything…(cough, yes I do, cough)…but I won! I held plank for six minutes and fifty-four seconds. Being a gymnast definitely came in handy.

The rest of the week consisted of indian sprints, stairs, starts, mat runs, ankles, and more abs. On Thursday, I also decided to try hurdles. Hurdles are usually for tall people….but….wait for it…. I was not the shortest one there (I need a clapping emoji)! We didn’t actually jump over the hurdles, but we did a bunch of drills. There were about six of us who decided to try hurdles, and all of us were new to them. It was nice that I was not the only clueless one there.

Image courtesy of tmelero.com

Gymnastics took up twenty-four hours of my week. The rest of my time was spent going to school, doing homework, and sleeping. That’s about it. Now, about ten of those twenty-four hours a week are spent doing track. That leaves me with fourteen hours left. This leaves me plenty of time to do homework AND watch T.V.. WHAT IS THIS WORLD!? To blow your mind even more, on Friday, I was an actual teenager. If you are a gymnast, you know what it is like. You have VERY little social life. On this day, Ali, Daisy and I did not go to track because the honors chemistry placement test for next year was at the same time. When we finished the test, the three of us went to The Mine Bouldering Gym in Kimball Junction. After climbing for about an hour and a half, we walked over to Cafe Rio (I need the heart eyed emoji because it is delicious!). We ran into two other friends and the five of us ate dinner together. It was so fun! AND THEN to add to this day, my friend Jamie from gymnastics came to my house. We played board games, ate pizza, and watched Despicable Me in Spanish. I would say this was another successful week.

Day 1

So, now that I have so much time on my hands, I need something to do. It has been two weeks since I have quit, and so far all I have done is watch Netflix. Luckily, it was a break so I could get away with it. But now that break is over and school is starting again, that will not be happening. Sunday night before school, my mom and I were talking about school sports. So I texted my friend Daisy, and she told me she was doing track, and practice started sometime that week. I had nothing better to do so I thought I might as well try it out! Well, that wasn’t exactly my mind set. Even when I got to the high school I wasn’t sure if I wanted to go to practice. Daisy and I convinced our friend Ali to go to track with us. Oh, I forgot to mention track was that Monday. So, as we walked into the high school, I was still trying to convince Daisy and Ali that we should just go to Ali’s house instead. But they convinced me to go. The coaches started talking, and I had no idea what they were talking about, so I just followed Daisy (who did cross country earlier in the year and knew what she was doing) and ended up going with the long distance runners. 

Daisy and I in our uniforms!

This may be kind of sad to some of you guys, but the most I have run before is three miles. This was also the last time I ran distance, period. And it happened to be in May. It is now February. Nine months ago. If you know anything about track, (which I don’t), you would know the longest distance you run is two miles. WRONG. Well, kind of. Yes, in meets, you only run two miles, but not in practice. The long distance coach begins telling us about our training schedule and goals for the year. Everyones goal is to run ten miles by the end of year. TEN MILES!? WHO RUNS TEN MILES? Not me. For sure. Ali and I look at each with the “ARE YOU CRAZY?” kind of look. Then I look over to Daisy, the experienced one, and she has the “no big deal” face on. Alright….looks like we are running ten miles today. Except that didn’t happen. THANK THE LORD! Ali and I ran four miles (which is the most I have ever run. Yes, I know. Hold the applause.) and everyone else ran eight miles. So I guess you could consider my first day of track a success.

Secret Sister

Recently, a handful of the Mini’s moved up to level six. They are ages seven through ten, and they are adorable. Our coach, Katy, decided we should have a bonding activity with the new level sixes to help them feel welcome to our workout group. So one day, she put all of our names into two buckets, one with the big girl’s names (that would be me), and the other with the little girl’s names. We each drew a name out of the appropriate bucket, but we were not allowed to tell anyone whose name we drew, except for Katy, who kept a file in her computer. This person whose name we drew was now our secret sister. Our job as a secret sister is to give a small gift, card, or some sort of encouragement to our secret sister. And, of course, we have to keep it a secret from everyone. Well, kind of. We have all shared within the two groups. The big girls shared with the big girls, and the little girls with the little girls. So whenever a big girl is setting up their gift for a little girl, the rest of us keep watch and make sure no little girls intrude to discover the secret. 

Having a secret sister is an ongoing process. It is fun to see the reaction of our teammates when they receive a gift, or how excited they are about an idea for their secret sister. The other day, I received my first gift from my secret sister. It was Valentine’s day, so she decorated a card, and gave me a water bottle filled with candy (sour patch watermelon, my favorite!). She wrapped it up and put it above my locker at the gym. It was adorable. 

The adorable card from my secret sister

This same day I also happened to give a gift to my secret sister. I gave her a Valentine’s day themed box of chocolates, and wrote a note. My group, the big girls, kept watch for any littles while I set up my present in my secret sister’s locker. The next day when I came to gym, my secret sister had a whiteboard setup on the outside of her locker saying “thank you s.s!” (we all sign our gifts “s.s” for secret sister, which reminds me of a funny story….) That note made me feel as good as receiving a gift of my own. I love having a secret sister to give to and receive something from. It helps remind me that someone is watching me and believes in me. 

So, time for the funny story I mentioned earlier. The first person to receive a secret sister gift was Patrisha. She is the youngest of the big girls, and gets to gym late because of school. So one day, she comes into the gym and asks me, “Do you know who’s initials are S.S.?”. I didn’t, so the two of us went through all of the names on our team, but no one had the initials S.S. I asked her why she was wondering and she told me there was a present and a card in her locker signed S.S. I told her I had no idea who it was from. Of course it never occurred to either of us that it was a secret sister gift. Duh! So about a week later in the car (we all carpool from school to gym) it had somehow come up in our conversation and one of the girls in the car said, “Um, I’m pretty sure it stands for secret sister…”. WOW. My team and I are pretty special. We had about a five minute laugh attack that day.

Meet Jitters

Today was my first competition of the season. Isn’t it a little late for season to start? Well, I have not been competing this year, and was not planning on competing at all, but at the last minute I decided to compete at this local meet. The meet today was in Lindon, Utah, about an hour away. It was a smaller meet, but it was nice to start off my season. But being the first meet, I had a lot of meet jitters. The night before I literally went to sleep at 8:45, knowing I would be awake super early. And I was right, I woke up at 5:30. On a Saturday. Because of this, I had seven hours until my meet. Seven hours for me to fret. Seven hours to freak myself out. The time dragged on. And on. And on. And on.

Post-Meet Dinner

So, after everyone competed, we went out to dinner. My team goes to this same meet every year, so we have continued a tradition. This was the fifth year in a row that after the meet my team and I went to Buca Di Beppo for dinner. Buca Di Beppo is a family size, Italian restaurant. It is flat out my favorite restaurant. Ever. I have so many memories there and the food is delicious. Other than the food itself, I love the ambiance of the restaurant. It is old fashioned with red carpet floors, red and white checkered table cloths, old black and white pictures all over the walls, and unique statues. There is something new to see everywhere you look. 

Image Courtesy of Hispanic Lifestyle

To split between eight girls, we ordered three pasta dishes and a salad. Now maybe you can imagine just how big the portions are. Eight teenage girls who just did gymnastics for about four hours...we were pretty hungry. We didn't even finish any of the pastas! Everything was delicious! This trip to Buca Di Beppo is so special to me, it was all I thought about the whole month before the meet, making sure everyone knew the plan. So concluding the day with the tradition of Buca Di Beppo with my team was something to distract myself throughout the day.

Full of Blocks of Foam

The dirty, pungent, itchy thing full of blocks of foam. You never know what is down there: socks, bandaids, food, and of course the dust, dirt, and dead skin. When you land, the contents fly into your nose, eyes and mouth. Yep, sounds delightful. It is like looking at a ball pit you played in as a child thinking, “Why in the world did I ever enjoy this? Nasty.”

But…..

The fluffy, injury free, life saving thing full of blocks of foam. Like landing in a cloud of comfort. You can land on your head over and over, and get right back up and try again like it never happened. 

For example...yes, this is me.

So, how can I be describing the same thing? What is this revolting yet glorious “thing”? Three words: the foam pit. 

Image courtesy of Firestorm

 The pit is the life-saver for all gymnasts. You can chuck almost any skill imaginable, and come out perfectly healthy. Well, other than the contents you inhaled when you landed. Truly, the worst outcome is getting stuck head first and needing your teammates to dig you out. 

But…after a certain amount of time, the foam blocks get packed down, calling for a fluffing. This means the whole team jumps in the pit and starts throwing all of the blocks out until you reach the bottom. The job of fluffing the pit fits my initial description: nasty. The pit is about eight feet deep and contains one thousand blocks, all of which must be taken out. As you get closer to the bottom, the grosser it gets, as the small items weave their way through to settle down there.

No matter how many points I make on how horrible the job of fluffing the pit is, I have to admit, I do enjoy it. It is a time where my teammates and I can talk about things other than gymnastics. We come up with games to play or blast the music and sing at the top of our lungs. Some of the younger girls try to build tunnels in the foam, and us older girls help them since we are pros from doing the same thing forever ago.

One activity we do to entertain ourselves while emptying the pit is to throw all of the blue blocks on one side of the pit, and black blocks to the opposite side. Then once the pit is empty, we push all of the blocks in, and the two colors of the pit are divided in half. 

Foam Art in 2010 (sorry its kind of blurry!)

During the process of putting the blocks back in, someone always ends up getting pushed in with the blocks, and sinks all the way to the bottom. It is always interesting to figure out a way of getting them out without getting stuck yourself. And when all of the blocks are put back in and we have finished admiring our masterpiece, everyone wants to jump in. We jump off the bar, or throw the little girls in just to have them get stuck again.

Another time we really enjoy the pit is during sleepovers at the gym. When you are younger, it is the first place everyone wants to sleep. Looking back to those past sleepovers, I still don’t understand how I could ever sleep in there. Maybe because it is warm and makes you feel safe when you are little? Well, maybe not, since there is always the rumor of the pit monster. It is also the go-to hiding spot for the little ones when we play night games. And of course you can use the pit and the area surrounding it to make an exceptional fort.

So overall, the pit is the best invention ever. It is life saving when you are doing skills, and a good time to bond with the team when it calls for a fluffing. So to whoever invented the pit, I give you a round of applause. You are a genius. 

The Gymnastics Movie of All Time

Every single gymnast has seen the movie Stick It. This movie is one of the closest representations of a gymnast’s life and captures the intensity of gymnastics. It has the drama of an everyday teenage girl, a lot of humor, and is quite inspiring to gymnasts. 

Cover

The main character of this movie is former gymnast Haley Graham. She was once considered one of the most talented gymnasts in the US, but walked out of the World Championship in the middle of the finals, costing the American gold medal and making her one of the most hated people in gymnastics. When Haley gets in trouble with the law, she is forced to go to the elite Vickerman Gymnastics Academy to learn discipline, honesty, integrity and teamwork.

Image courtesy of Flash Games

Throughout the movie, there are many scenes describing a gymnast’s life. One of my favorite quotes from the movie is:

“Gymnastics tells you no. All day long. It mocks you over and over again. Telling you you're an idiot. That you're crazy. If you like running full-speed towards a stationary object, vault is for you. If you like pealing pieces of skin the size of quarters of your hands... bars is for you. Because the only thing more fun than rips, is when your rips get rips. It's super sexy. And floor, are you serious, I mean who doesn't want to parade around in a leotard getting wedgies and doing dorky choreography? It's delicious. If you like falling, then gymnastics is the sport for you! You get to fall on your face, your ass, your back, your knees, and your pride! It's a good thing I didn't like falling... I LOVED IT!” 

-Haley Graham

Although this movie is about gymnastics, it is not just for gymnasts. Besides the fact it is hilarious, it is relatable to other people too (although it is mostly for girls). It gives a positive message of pushing through and overcoming obstacles, and to stand up for what you believe in. But these messages are shown in their own unique way.

Whenever I am with my team, this is our go-to movie; I have seen it about fifteen times and it never gets old. I know every single word to this movie, so if you have not seen it, just come to me and I can narrate the whole thing for you.

gymnast terminology:

“stick it” : plant the landing with proper technique and no stumbles