Dec. 14, 2007
Get behind the scenes of Illinois Gymnastics with Illini Ink - the weekly women's gymnastics journal. In this week's edition, junior Marijka Botterman talks about the Mixed Pairs Exhibition, final exams week and Christmas break.
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Hello Illini fans!
Wow...what a weekend! We finally kicked off our season with our annual Mixed Pairs event. It was a great time partnering up with the guys team and competing for the first time this season. Before the meet everyone was a little bit nervous but excitement took over. Freshman, Allison Buckley, and sophomore, Luke Stannard, took home the title with a combined score of 49.875 (two scores taken from each gymnast). The girls team had celebrity judges, so some of the scores weren't real, but the judges did a good job differentiating the great routines. Some of the routines that really stuck out were sophomore, Sarah Schmidt's floor routine, along with senior, Michelle McGrady's STUCK yurechenko full (they both got 10's!). Junior, Julie Crall, was back in action, which was exciting to see after her season ending injury last March. Suki (Nicole Cowart) had a phenomenal bar routine, and all of the freshmen's routines were especially exciting to watch because we didn't know how they were going to compete. I have to say they all did extremely well (and hit every routine they performed), and impressed everyone. All in all, we had a really good time. Competing at Huff definitely brought back good memories from last season. Thanks to all the fans that came to support Illini gymnastics by cheering us on!
A weekend full of fun and energy left us studying harder than ever for finals. All of the girls are popping in and out of the gym in between studying and taking tests. This week we have unofficial practice and it is pretty laid back, however, everyone is finding time to come in to the gym to stay on top of their game. Academics are very important to our team, but it's nice to take a little study break to get your mind off of exams by going into the gym to work out. Hopefully, after our finals are over we can get some Christmas shopping in before we head home.
We are all looking forward to going home for Christmas break to see our friends and family. We have to be back at school for practice two days after Christmas in order to be ready for our first meet against Alabama on January 11th.
Don't miss our first dual meet against Ohio State at Huff Hall on January 19th!
Thanks!
Maj
