“More than 400 girls compete in gymnastics meet in Salina” plus 1 more

More than 400 girls compete in gymnastics meet in Salina

Posted: 14 Mar 2011 03:30 AM PDT

3/14/2011
By GARY DEMUTH Salina Journal

Raegan Mantz likes gymnastics because it helps her excel in other sports.

The 11-year-old from Sterling clutched her sixth-place trophy for all-around excellence in uneven bars, balance beam, vault and floor exercise in her division at Tumble in the Jungle 2011, a three-day gymnastics event that concluded Sunday at Kansas State University at Salina.

While Raegan loves gymnastics, she said it also helps make her a better competitor at volleyball, basketball, softball and track.

"It helps me be flexible," she said.

Raegan was one of about 445 girls from ages 4 to 17 from throughout Kansas and Blue Springs, Mo., that attended the weekend gymnastics meet, hosted by the Salina YMCA.

The Salina YMCA team, the Salina Gemstars, and the Extreme Gymnastics team through Salina Parks and Recreation, had about 75 competitors in the event.

Each girl competes according to age and ability, receiving individual event scores and an all-around score.

Salinan Dalisa Maxton coaches a team of girls ages 8 through 12 that took first place Saturday in overall excellence for her level five team, which she said was a middle-skill level.

"I'm really excited," she said. "The girls have been working hard, and it's nice when it pays off."

Jeff Harris, president of the Salina Gemstars Booster Club, has two daughters in gymnastics, one age 9 and a 6-year-old. He said he's impressed at the dedication it takes to excel in gymnastics.

"Besides the athletic part, it builds a good work ethic," he said. "You just can't do this once a week. It takes a lot of effort and determination."

This is the first year the Salina meet has been at Kansas State University at Salina, Harris said. Last year, it was at Salina Central High School.

"There's more floor space here," he said.

Trisha Fast, coach of the Flip Flop Shop, a gymnastics team from Newton, said she was impressed with the Salina meet.

"Events like this are what the girls work toward," she said.

Last year, Salina hosted the Missouri Valley District Championships at Salina Central High, said Bev Jones, gymnastics coordinator at the Salina YMCA and director of Tumble in the Jungle.

This year's state championship will be April 29 through May 1 in Wamego, she said.

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Utah Utes gymnastics notebook: Marsdens take blame for U. gymnast's score

Posted: 14 Mar 2011 10:32 PM PDT

Published: Monday, March 14, 2011 11:24 p.m. MDT

Utah gymnastics co-coaches Greg and Megan Marsden gave junior Stephanie McAllister permission to yell at them this week.

She didn't do it.

She didn't let the reason that gave her that rare permission bother her at all. As always.

"Stephanie? No," said Greg Marsden. "We were very apologetic to her, but that's not Steph, to lose sleep over that kind of thing."

McAllister, who was the nation's No. 5 all-arounder last week, received a 0.2 deduction in Saturday's 196.60-196.325 loss at No. 5 Oregon State in her floor exercise. The deduction was because the two judges at that meet noted that she did not have a proper combination of a leap off of one foot into a 180-degree split combined with another leap or jump.

The coaches thought her routine had met the requirement, and no other judges through Utah's first nine meets had deducted her for the skills the way she did them.

"These judges pointed out that this technically didn't meet the letter of the rule, and so they started her at a 9.8," said Greg Marsden.

"It's not going to be hard to fix at all," said Megan Marsden, "but it is the mistake of we coaches not understanding the rule perfectly. We can't interact with judges, so it's up to us in meets to have judges catch stuff like that, and nobody's told us anything on leaps until this."

Megan took the blame and said it's the coaches' jobs to know all the nuances of the rules.

Though the deduction wouldn't have changed the team outcome, Megan said she felt bad that the deduction hurt McAllister's all-around score by 0.2, and that's probably how she dropped a bit in this week's rankings.

"No. It was just a mistake," said McAllister with that cheerful smile that got her nicknamed "Happy." "We just had all made a mistake."

While she didn't know why her score was low but saw the coaches conferring with the officials about it, she said it didn't bother her on beam. "I would say it didn't affect my beam at all," she said. She scored 9.85 on that last event to go with a 9.85 on bars and 9.80 on vault. She got 9.60 with the -0.2 on floor, so she'd have totaled 39.30 without the deduction.

STILL CHAMPIONS: The Utes remain the overall NCAA women's sports attendance champions for the second straight year. They drew an average of 13,503 fans for their six home meets, and for the second straight year, that beat out Tennessee's vaunted women's basketball attendance of 13,078, as well as Alabama's gymnastics attendance of 12,730.

Utah went into its final home meet, March 4 with top-ranked Florida, only four ahead of Alabama for the gymnastics title, but the NCAA-record crowd of 15,558 that night left the Ute program uncatchable.

Last year, the Utes averaged 14,213 fans per meet, an NCAA gymnastics record.

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Gymnastics Sports

Monday, March 14, 2011