A Silver medal at the British Championships has resulted in a call-up to represent Great Britain at the forthcoming Senior World Championships, for a trio of female gymnasts from Deerness Gymnastics Academy.
The trio of acrobatic gymnasts, Caitlin Owston, 19, from Belmont, Amelia Pamler, 18, from Great Lumley & Bethany MacDougall, 14, from Newton Aycliffe, took Silver at the British Championships last weekend in their first competition as senior gymnasts, after making the transition from junior level where they had previously won gold at national level and bronze at European level.
They will now compete at the World Championships as part of Great Britain Senior Team in Antwerp, Belgium, between 13 and 15 April. The Trio will be ranked as the number one Women’s Group in the team by virtue of attaining the highest overall score at the British Championships, although they won the Silver medal in the final performance.
In fact it’s a trio of call-ups for the Durham based charitable organisation as head of acrobatics, Stuart Thompson, a former winner of British Gymnastics Coach of the Year Award, has been named as a coach for the senior Great Britain team and Katie Lawton, another high-performance coach at the club will be a judge on behalf of GB.
Acrobatic gymnastics is a modern and artistic gymnastic discipline, which requires an extraordinary amount of courage and trust amongst gymnasts. Routines are choreographed to music and presented on a 12 x 12 metre sprung floor surface.
Great Britain is one of the most respected nations in the world in acrobatic gymnastics and has achieved success at World and European level with medals in all categories. Many of whom have come from Deerness Gymnastics Academy.
“This is great news for the trio, the club and British Gymnastics- to have such hard working, committed and talented people representing them on the World Stage. Making the step up from junior to senior level is never easy but this trio has worked exceptionally hard to achieve it and to be ranked as GB’s number 1 Women’s Group is a great achievement,” said Stuart Thompson, head of acrobatics, Deerness Gymnastics Academy and the trio’s coach.
“The whole club will be supporting in them their first major competition as senior competitors. We are all hoping they can build on their success as juniors and continue to inspire many more young gymnasts at the club.”
Deerness Gymnastics Academy in Ushaw Moor is a high-performance centre for British Gymnastics. The club which also has its former gymnast Matt Baker as its patron and has become one of Britain’s top gymnastics clubs over the past thirty years, with over 100 international gymnasts with more than eighty World and European medallists, including fifteen World and European Champions in its roll of honour. It is not only one of the most successful clubs in Great Britain but it is also recognised on the International scene as one of the top clubs in the world.