3:19pm Friday 16th May 2008
Acrobatic and tumbling gymnasts from Andover Gymnastics Club were in action recently at the Bucks Open held in Milton Keynes.
This is the only regional event to allow entries from any club in the country, with many using it as a warm-up for the GB finals.
Francis Lawrence and Morgan Oakes represented Andover in the Prep B Women's Pairs. Although Morgan was the youngest competitor their routine earned them the gold. Their continual hard work in their year long wait until Morgan was old enough to compete has been well rewarded with two golds in two competitions.
Mixed pair Lee Barnard and Rachel Wiseman at level two had a clean routine which earned them gold and the medal haul continued with the newly-formed FIG 11-16 women's pair of Charlotte Tyler and Elizabeth Vinten. After six weeks working together, creating two new routines at a much higher level than before, the girls won silver on their first outing. Lucy Jones, Lauren Parrett and Jasmin Patel, again performing at a higher level with two routines for the first time, also claimed silver.
FIG trio Iesha People, Rebecca Butcher and Holly Guiver performed a strong dynamic routine and also claimed silver.
Bronze medals were claimed by Hannah Jones, Amy Jones and Hollie West - performing hard moves in preparation for the move to Junior level at the end of the year and the newly-formed grade 1 rrio of Sian Wilkinson, Milly McGaughey and Emily Tyler.
Grade two Ellie Vanderplank, Molly Batchelor and Jade Lloyd danced a strong routine but a mistake in the first move dropped them out of medal contention in fourth.
The tumblers also collected medals. Alice Langdown produced three clean and tidy runs to claim gold and there were both junior and senior FIG tumblers competing but due to the small numbers it was split into male and female groups rather than by age.
Jenna Barrett performed three well executed runs resulting in gold and Charlotte Biles and Laura Seelig, in their first competition claimed second and third.
Jamie Leach finished first after producing three solid runs, with Kaylum Batchelor second, Jamie Stanley third and Benny Leach fourth.
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