Abbey and Gymnastics

Abbey has really gotten good at gymnastics.  She has been in gymnastics since August, but we found our new gym in November.  I took some footage of her.  It's amazing to see how strong she has gotten!  She just made the competitive team.  She has practice for 7 1/2 hours a week.  During the summer her practice will be 9 1/2 hours a week.  I never realized how hard gymnastics was and is.  She spends so much time conditioning and building her strength and she still doesn't have the strength to do some of the moves. 

It is fun to watch her and she how she improves month to month.  One of the little girls in her class quite after a couple of weeks.  I asked Abbey why the little girl was no longer there, Abbey's reply, "she couldn't take the pressure".  That is a pretty true statement.  The coaches are pretty tough on the girls.  The rope climb use to cause a lot of tears for her, but she has mastered that now.  Abbey is in a class with mostly 7-9 year old.  As I watch her I can tell that she cognitively doesn't understand the way these other girls do.  And she just doesn't seem as good.  They finally got a 6 year old on the team, and Abbey is better and stronger than her.  So I finally realized, as a 5 year old, she is really good.  She really has a lot of raw, natural talent.  I hope that she will stick with this sport long enough to see what she may be capable of doing.