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Level Four State Fun Meet
Web Release March 16, 2009
Jacksonville Gymnastics Level Four Team Ends
Successful 2008 – 2009 Competitive Season
at the Arkansas State Fun Meet
The Arkansas State Level Four Fun Meet was held Saturday, March 14th at Flame Gymnastics Academy at Fort Smith, Arkansas. Four sessions were held during the day, and gymnasts of different ages competed at different times. After divisions were made by age, some of the age divisions were then broken down further into flights, with at least one age division being broken down into Flights of A through H. There were 206 gymnasts, ages six through twelve and over, from 21 teams who competed in the day-long meet.
Thirteen gymnasts represented the seventeen-member Jacksonville Gymnastics Level Four Team. Our competing gymnasts, who ranged in age from seven to twelve, were Sara Balenko, Miranda Chambers, Jessica Gardner, Dalianna Gonzalez, Sara Heil, Olivia Hodson, Courtney Jackson, Mollie Johnson, Jenna Mecca, Taylor Parker, Jadyn Perkins, Madison Williams and Rachel Wyrick. A competitive meet is a lot more fun when the entire team can compete together as a team, but our gymnasts did very well, in spite of being in different sessions. Luckily, each group had more than one of our team gymnasts in it, so each had a competing companion and they all had a very successful meet.
Fourteen age six gymnasts and 27 age seven gymnasts competed in the early morning session. Competing for Jacksonville Gymnastics were seven-year-old Sarah Balenko and Courtney Jackson.
Courtney and Sarah
Competing in the second session were 15 older gymnasts, age twelve and up, and 46 eight-year-old gymnasts. Jacksonville gymnasts competing in this session in the twelve-and-up age division were Dalianna Gonzales, Jessica Gardner and Rachel Wyrick.
Dalianna, Rachel and Jessica
Competing in the third session of the day were 52 nine-year-old gymnasts, including the Jacksonville Gymnastics gymnasts – Miranda Chambers, Sara Heil, Olivia Hodson, Mollie Johnson, Taylor Parker and Madison Williams.
Back row - Taylor, Miranda, Madison and Molly; front row - Olivia and Sara
Competing in the last session of the day, were 41 ten-year old gymnasts and 11 eleven-year-old gymnasts, including our two gymnasts, age ten, from Jacksonville Team, Jenna Mecca and Jadyn Perkins.
The gymnasts had terrific scores, some as high as 9.5 and 9.6 on different events, and all ended up with very good individual All-Around Scores and placements as shown below.
| ALL- | PLACE- | ||||||
| NAME | AGE | VAULT | BARS | BEAM | FLOOR | AROUND | MENT |
| Sarah Balenko | 7 | 5 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 35.700 | 2 |
| Courtney Jackson | 7 | 4 | 5 | 4 | 5 | 33.900 | 4 |
| Sara Heil | 9A | 1 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 36.200 | 2 |
| Taylor Parker | 9C | 6 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 35.100 | 5 |
| Olivia Hodson | 9F | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 37.100 | 2 |
| Miranda Chambers | 9G | 4 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 37.050 | 2 |
| Madison Williams | 9G | 5 | 4 | 1 | 4 | 36.450 | 4 |
| Mollie Johnson | 9H | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 37.050 | 1 |
| Jenna Mecca | 10G | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 35.950 | 2 |
| Jadyn Perkins | 10G | 5 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 36.450 | 1 |
| Jessica Gardner | 12A | 3 | 5 | 1 | 4 | 35.100 | 3 |
| Dalianna Gonzalez | 12B | 2 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 36.450 | 2 |
| Rachel Wyrick | 12B | 4 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 35.750 | 3 |
Three of our Level four gymnasts, Marissa Wallace, Lauren Travis and Madison Barnhill had conflicting events at the time of their competition and Lauren Osburn could not compete due to having broken her finger in a four-wheeler accident. Oh, well, girls will be girls!
The Level Four gymnasts have had a very successful competitive season this year. They attended eight meets, including the State Fun Meet. Meets attended were Harvest Invitational at Delta Gymnastics, West Memphis; Holiday Classic at Dorsey Gymnastics, Sheridan; Pepsi Challenge hosted by Hot Springs at Hot Springs; Yankee Doodle hosted by Flip Flop at Pine Bluff Convention Center; Louisiana Invitational hosted by AcroSports at Shreveport; Flame Gymnastics hosted by Flame at the Fort Smith Convention Center; Emerald Classic hosted by Jax Gym at Cabot High School; and the State Fun Meet held this weekend at Flame Gymnastics Academy at Fort Smith.
The team won three First-Place team awards, three Second-Place team awards and one Third-Place team award. The team won 13 First-Place Individual All-Around honors and 60 First-Place Event Awards. The team was coached this season by Laurel Spears and Christy Ellis. It was a good season and we congratulate you all. We also thank Lois Bryan for coaching the team at the State Fun Meet. You did a great job, Lois, and you are so appreciated. We thank the parents and grandparents for your unending support. It's been a great year with lots of accomplishments and lots of fun and a really great team of girls - it just seemed like such a short season. We look forward to lots of work on new skills over the next two and a half months and then the hard work during the summer months.
Jacksonville Gymnastics Level Four Team - First Place Team at Emerald Classic
Jacksonville Gymnastics Level Four Team - Second Place at Flame Gymnastics Meet
The Nine-Year-Old Level Fours showing off their pretty initialized State Fun Meet Bags and they all had matching flip flops, too.
Thanks to Lisa Chambers for the State Fun Meet Photos!!!!!