Meet me in the barn

Have you ever been to Plover, WI? Not much to do in Plover.
Except hold a gymnastics meet!

Yes, we went to Carousel Gymnastics in Plover on Saturday so Clare could compete in a smaller meet. Only three gyms were at the meet, and our Madtown girls far outnumbered the rest. Our session was Levels 5 and 6 with only two events at a time! Yes, that means there was a time when the floor music wasn’t playing! Half the girls were on bars, half were on vault (with no music). Then they flipped-flopped events to vault and bars. When those two events were done the judges and the girls moved to floor and beam. Ah, there’s the music. Then they flip-flopped those two events to finish up.

Because of the limited number of girls, the Level 5 gymnasts were combined into only 2 age classes. Our Madtown girls took first, second, fourth, fifth, seventh, and eighth place. Clare was the one in fifth, so she was pretty happy.

Scoring was hard to figure out at this meet. As parents, you sit in the stands and can kind of tell what routines are OK, good, very good, and great. Based on that, we try to anticipate the scores. After years of doing this, we think we’re pretty good. This meet was much more difficult to figure out. There were many a head-shake after some scores were posted. Huh? A 9.75 for some girl on bars who rarely gets above a 9? Whatever; good for her. Wild.

Oh, the title of the post is in reference to the FARM on which the gym resides. The gym itself is in a separate steel shed no bigger than it has to be to contain all four apparatuses. (I looked it up – it’s not apparati, but it sounds like it could be.)  Seriously, we drove into someone’s driveway, parked on the grass, then walked into the building. Good for them for giving these girls a place to practice and compete.

Here are some random pics: