Shireen's competition season started early this year with a
meet in
Culver City, California (which is in the Los Angeles area)
Shireen did very well in her meet. She took 2nd on Vault, Third
on Beam and Bars, and Third Overall.
Her wonderful teammate McKenna took first all around.
Some of Shireen's teammates:
Brittany, Sydney, and McKenna (Taylor wasn't in this picture)
Shireen was excited to compete her first meet of the "regular" season in Salt Lake!
Shireen took 5th place on Vault (8.7), 3rd place on Beam (9.175)
4th place on Floor (9.050), and 4th Overall (35.375)
It was great having many of her gym friends there to support her!
Click here to (hopefully) see Shireen competing in this meet!
Shireen and Taylor are warming up for their meet.
They both wore "crazy socks" to keep their feet warm on the cement floor.
National Anthem time
Shireen did good this meet on the two events that she didn't
do well last meet!
She got a 9.3 on vault!!!! Her first high score on vault ever!!
Her bars were looking better and she got a 9.250.
She fell on beam and got a 8.725
She fell on floor also and got a 8.3.
She ended out 1st place on Vault and Bars and 3rd overall!
They went back and had a fun time swimming at the motel with
her friends!
It was a fun (quick) trip.
Here is Coach Natasha (and Yuriy behind) giving instructions before the meet.
Shireen had her best meet yet scoring very good on three events!
She got a 9.0 on vault
She got a 9.35 on bars and had a beautiful bar routine!
She got a 9.225 on beam with her best routine yet!
She fell again on floor and got an 8.75.
Even with those great scores, Shireen only got 5th place on
bars and beam.
She did take 3rd place overall with very tough competition!!
Shireen and Taylor start to get ready with Natasha and Yuriy.
Their meet started on the floor. Shireen looked pretty good
and got a 9.0.
Then she did Vault and got an 8.7 which was ok.
Shireen had a very rough bar routine. She said the bar was slippery
and she had to stop on the lower bar and it messed up her routine.
She ended out with an 8.3 but hoped to redeem herself on beam.
Then she got a 7.65 on beam with two falls! It wasn't a very good meet!
The next day, the other girls competed and our team really didn't
do well
except for Brittany who looked very good in Level 7.
Shireen recovered from her bad meet to enjoy the rest of the weekend.
We really enjoyed the meet but just wished we had done better!
We got to visit with a friend who was one of Natasha's former
gymnasts.
Kaitlin stayed in Utah last summer and got to be good friends with the girls.
A highlight of the competition was the opening ceremony that
they did on Saturday.
It included teams dressing up for an award. The team that dressed up like
Deal or No Deal girls with silver cases won and we all loved it.
They also watched an Ohio State boys team demonstration.
And of course the balloon drop was really fun!
It was so great to compete in Los Angeles!
Shireen and Taylor start to get ready to compete.
It was great to be staying in the same hotel as the meet.
It made it so easy to wake up and go downstairs and be ready for the 9:00 am
start.
I also was excited to have Sheila and Shaida there to cheer
her sister on!
We all stayed in the hotel over night so we could make it.
It would have been over an hour drive to go from the girls apartment.
Illia's girls Ashley and Kendall also came to this meet so we actually had a full team.
This is all of the Level 7 and Level 8 girls from our gym.
Shireen had a better meet but it still wasn't her best.
She got an 8.75 on bars with a good routine but not her best.
She got a 9.0 on Beam with a really good routine with just a few wobbles.
She got an 8.6 on floor with a bad front tumbling pass
but she was able to save it from a fall by squatting down but it still got a
high deduction.
She did her first "tsuk" with a pike instead of a tuck on vault.
She fell on her first one but did pretty good on the second one and got an 8.625.
It was fun to have a gymnastic meet the same place that Shireen
has danced before!
We loved having great seats (with backs!) in the big Spectrum Arena at USU.
I did a horrible job taking pictures with only one good one for this meet.
Shireen had a very good meet and ended up taking 6th place overall.
Her scores:
Vault: 8.8 (doing the tsuk-pike) - 6th place
Bars: 9.1 - 5th place
Floor: 9.025
Beam: 9.125 - 5th
She had a great beam routine and we felt the score was a bit low but still good!
Overall: 36.05 - 6th place!!
Shireen led her Level 8 team wearing beautiful Hawaiian Leis.
Shireen did very well and received high scores on bars, beam,
and floor.
She still had trouble with her tsuk-pike on vault.
Scores:
Vault - 8.350 (did not place)
Bars - 9.225 (4th place)
Beam - 9.300 - (2nd place)
Floor - 9.000 (5th place)
All Around - 35.875 (5th place)
Shireen had a good meet and qualified for Regionals which will be a great experience!
It was a hard road to regionals. Shireen got the Flu 3 days
after her State meet.
She was down in bed very sick a week.
She only had one more week to practice for Regionals.
I was just glad that Shireen worked hard and was able to compete!
I didn't do a good job recording this fun experience with pictures.
I was busy videoing the meet and didn't take any pictures except one after the
meet.
We didn't even get any with her coaches!!
This is a picture of Shireen with a few of her Utah competitors
from other gyms.
They include Madison from Olympus and Victoria from GTC.
They divided the ages up and Shireen did not compete with any Utah girls in
her group.
Shireen's Scores:
Vault - 8.575 (still not good with her tsuk-pike!)
Bars - 8.825 (not her best bars but she did pretty well.)
Beam - 9.000 (she looked very good on beam!)
Floor - 8.8 (she did pretty good with this also.)
Her coaches were very happy with Shireen's performance
It was a great experience and I'm sure will help her with confidence competing
past State in the future!
Natasha bought this beautiful Leotard for Shireen at Regionals.
It was a really fun experience.
Shireen even got to see San Francisco on Saturday.
Look for the pictures on the What's New section.