Gymnastics.
It is a sport participated in by a few and watched by many. For some, it is a lifestyle by choice. Gymnasts will spend at least 20 hours a week in practice perfecting tricks and learning to be safe while learning to fly, dance, balance and tumble.
For Kingston’s Sam Thompson, she had to wait just a little bit longer to compete. She is a Level 5 gymnast at Olympic Gymnastic Center and now, is probably the youngest competitor to qualify for a state berth in the USAG trials (USA Gymnastics).
Sam, known as ‘Little Sam’ stands at just over 36 inches, sports fire red hair and is full of energy. She started on this team at 6 years old and traveled to Las Vegas for competition in January. There, she competed at her first and last meet. That was it for her until a few weeks ago. The legal age for competition is 7 for Level 5 Washington gymnastics athletes. Not to be deterred, Sam practiced daily with the team, traveled to all the meets, did warm-ups with the team and finally in early April, she had her first competition at the Seattle Sectionals.
It was her first legal competition, and at one week past the legal age limit Sam hit the floor, flew the bars, scaled the beam, ran at full speed toward a stationary object and vaulted clean over it with no hesitation. Sam was the hit of the event. Hundreds of eyes watched the little flyer post high scores on all the apparatus, include one over 9.0.
In the end, as the qualifiers were called up, one after another. Lots of them were from the big schools in Seattle and Sam’s name was called up as a qualifier. Her look of surprise was only matched by the excitement of many parents and the gymnasium full of athletes.
Little Sam practiced hard with the team and will now join 9 others from her team and head to state on May 2nd to compete for a title. At barely seven years old, this locked Little Sam into the rolls as one of the youngest ever to qualify to a Level 5 USAG state meet.
Brad Camp is a staff photographer for the Kitsap News Group, the parent company of the KCN. See this and other “Picture This” stories at the Blog: http://www.bradcampimages.blogspot.com.
