Ontario Winter Games
MUSKOKA — There was no medal in the cards for Port Sydney gymnast Elora Austrup, 11, but tying for first in the floor routine with a personal best score of 13.1 was a triumph all its own.
The 2010 Ontario Winter Games Women’s Artistic gymnastics competition was held at Muskoka Woods Resort in Rosseau on Friday. Thirty-two girls ages 11-13 from across the province competed for gold in four teams of eight. In a team competition, each gymnast completes an individual routine in all four events — bars, beam, vault and floor — but only the top three scores in each event count and go towards the team’s overall score.
Although Elora tied for first with her floor routine, helping her team to lead in the scoring for the floor event, her team’s final overall score in all four disciplines was not enough to make it to the podium.
“I think it was cool just to get this far,” said Elora. “I didn’t care how I placed, as long as I was there.”
Elora had so much fun competing at the games that she said she almost forgot it was a competition. “It was really fun. The cabins at Muskoka Woods were very nice,” she said, adding she knew a lot of the girls from past competitions.
“We had a lot of very happy gymnasts,” said Ruth Simpson, CEO for Gymnastics Ontario. “They come to the winter games for fun. The team situation is much more fun and it rarely happens at meets.”
In fact, Elora was so relaxed by the team environment that she tried something new in the bars competition that unfortunately didn’t pay off.
“I tried a handstand half turn,” explained Elora. “I’d done it twice before in practice.” The move was a last-minute addition, something she was able to risk because it was a team competition.
“It’s better competing as a team,” she said. “If you fall off anything, everyone else can still get a really high score.”
The Ontario Cup on March 28-29 in Ottawa is next for Ontario’s gymnasts, and Elora expects to attend. Unofficially she has qualified for the individual competition, however, at press time was still awaiting official confirmation. Bracebridge resident Natalie Kruger, 16, is also expected to attend the provincial meet.
Elora’s confidence is high going into the Ontario Cup, in part due to her personal success at the winter games.
“If I could accomplish something as big as that (winter games) and not get nervous,” she said, “then I think I can get pretty far.”