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Sports

Plymouth Gymnasts Bound Into National Championships

Hard work pays off for four members of the Euro Stars Gymnastics team who are preparing to compete on the national stage.

Four members of the Plymouth Euro Stars gymnastics team are heading to the national championships this month after strong showings at the regional competitions in April.

“It’s a great feeling knowing that all the hard work this season has paid off,” said Kaitlyn Betts, a senior.

Betts will be joined by teammates Kylie Fagan and Ellie Gosselin—both seniors at Walled Lake Northern—on May 12-15 at the national championships in Long Beach, CA.

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The three 18-year-olds are all level-10 competitors, the highest on a scale from 4-10, which ranks athletes based on age and ability.

Kelsey Thomas, 16, a junior at Walled Lake Northern, qualified for one of two level-9 national championships. She will head to Boston to compete in the eastern national championships Friday through Sunday. 

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Coach Peter Gueorguier—who competed internationally for 17 years in his native Bulgaria, qualifying for the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul, Korea—said that he is extremely proud of his national qualifiers but that they have their work cut out for them.

“It’s going to be a very tough competition,” he said. “But they have so much talent. We are very proud of them.”

The local gymnasts were among 380 competitors in the Region 5 bracket of the country, which encompasses Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Kentucky.

There were six age groups in the level-10 regional competitions, all advancing just six gymnasts to the national finals.

In preparation, Gueorguier said that the gymnasts practice 20 to 25 hours a week, on top of the demands of school. But, he said, they continue to excel in all of it.

“All of them are outstanding students,” he said.

The national championships will consist of four events: balance beam, vault, uneven parallel bars and floor routine.

Betts, who will be attending Utah State University next year on a Fulbright Scholarship, said that she and her teammates have a mixture of nerves and excitement, especially because as a senior it’s her last shot at a national title.

“I think more so for us,” she said of herself and her fellow senior gymnasts, “it’s our last year and our last chance to be a part of this thing.”

Fagan has committed to Central Michigan University and Gosselin will be attending Michigan State University. Thomas said that as a junior she is currently undecided. All four plan to compete in gymnastics in college.  

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