Personal Narrative Essay On Gymnastics

Deep breaths… Okay- you got this. It’s just you and the vault. Nothing else matters. You have done this a million times before. Nick always here to catch me if I fall. Muscle memory takes over. When I am in the right mental state, anything seems possible. Any athlete would agree with me. All sports are half mental. AS I run down the runway, I know why I am a gymnast. Every bounding step I take I run farther and farther from everything happening in my life. Farther and farther from all the distractions. I can only hear my feet pounding into the springboard. Flying off the vault with a power I don’t even know I contain, everything zapped into slow motion. This is what it all comes down to. Every minute of training in the gym. Every wrist and

When I was young, I fell in love with competitive figure skating. The ice was my second home, and every minute I spent on it was pure bliss. By the time I was ten, I had practices four times a week and several competitions a year. Unfortunately, my path to success did not leave me unscathed. I had many falls and accidents over the years, and getting back up was almost never easy. The worst accident occurred when I was first starting to skate. I was four years old, and it led to my parents almost taking me off of the ice forever.

Imagine walking on a four-inch piece of wood that is four feet off the ground, or flying through the air performing skills people only dream of doing. Gymnastics is a sport that taught me many things including, how to preserve through difficult situations and how to overcome my fears. I did gymnastics for ten years before I decided that the sport was too stressful and time consuming.

Everyone remembers that one place, that one place that instantly makes you feel good, that one place where you can completely act like yourself. For me, that one special location forever remains Texas Best Gymnastics, in McKinney, Tx. What I always adored was practicing with my team.I began competing there at the age of eight, and I competed my last competition shortly after my thirteenth birthday. However, even though I no longer spend half my time at the gym like I used to, it still invokes the same effect on me. Now that I stepped away from competing for a few years, when I look back on how stressful it seemed, I can still see all the wonderful memories I created. More than anything, I see what a wonderful impact the gym had on my life.

Most of my life I was consumed with the sport of gymnastics. I remember the rush I would get as it was my turn to compete in front of the cheering crowd. In those moments nothing else mattered; just me, the chalk on my calloused hands and the equipment in front of me. I have competed in gymnastics ever since I was five years old. I spent six days a week in the gym practicing all year round and even volunteered part of my time to a community program teaching gymnastics to children. Gymnastics had a tremendous role in shaping me into the person I am today and it is what also lead me to want to become a Physician Assistant.

Once, when I was a little girl, my family and I decided to take a trip to some cabins in North Little Rock. While we were staying at the cabins, we had forgotten to bring our DVD player so we had to watch whatever channels the cabin t.v. had. (It didn’t have many). After a minute of flipping, we found the Olympics. At first, it was boring. Disc throws, pole vaulting, running, it was all boring. Then, the performances came on (Diving and Gymnastics). The diving was neat. All these professional divers were jumping off these 20 meters high diving boards, doing flips and spins in the air then they’d hit the water. It was amazing, but then, came the gymnastics. When they came on, I was wowed. All the spins, turns, twirls, and lands.

One of the biggest things I’ve learned in the past four years is how to be apart of a team. In gymnastics, you had a team but you competed against them. Personal success was much more important than the success of your team as a whole. My mindset my whole life was to take care of myself, not others. In cheer, if you aren’t able to get along with

If I didn’t like it, then I didn’t have to continue. I tied a knot in my rope, and tried my best to hold on. I stood at the bar for months with straight knees, and my back in the straightest line I could manage. I stretched every day. I tried my best in class because I didn’t want them to tell me that I wasn’t good enough. We had extra classes to prepare us, and we had excersizes that we had to do at home. I did them all the time. I could tell I was getting better. I was getting so much stronger. My leg was getting higher every day.Then we received another

All I could pay attention to were the Doctor’s socks, sticking out from under his trousers. They had little sushis on them. I half-listened to his words- they sounded garbled like they would underwater. After a failed physical therapy program and a disappointing first doctor's’ appointment I prepared myself for the worst. After all, Osteochondritis Dissecans doesn’t exactly sound optimistic. My hearing finally came back to focus at the words “I can fix your arm. You can do gymnastics again.” I study the doctor. He isn’t tall, he has graying hair and sushi socks. His voice is encapturing - very clear and matter o fact. “ I can fix your elbow. You can do gymnastics again. It is not going to be easy to come back. But I can do it.”

As I rolled out of bed, very non-eager to start another day, I caught a glimpse of my 2nd place team State Championship medal. I stared at it, and the longer it’s image filled my mind, the angrier I got. I wanted to throw it across my room and never see it again. Irately, I walked past it and started dressing myself for another boring and completely predictable day. While I was doing this, I couldn’t help but remind myself of the moment I received that medal. The one moment where tears ran down my face because I was happy, sad, and angry all at once.

On March 3rd I went to my sister's gymnastics meet where they stretched, warmed up, and, practiced. first when they stretched they did simple things like Heel to butt, toe touch, and lots of other stretches. when they started to warm up they got on the balance beams and walked back and forth to get ready to practice. some of the other kids Suede back and forth on their hands. finally, when they started practicing they started doing some of the things they learned throughout the season. this the season was balanced beans they had to know how to walk backward on the balance beam and how to stand on one foot on the beam. the component of fitness in gymnastics Is flexibility, muscular endurance, And muscular strength. I was at this event for

Gymnastics is a fun way of expressing your and the inner animal in you. Well on this day I expressed Me and the inner animal in me. My team and I were on our way to a semi- final tournament and we were excited about it. As we stepped off the bus and approached the sidewalk we prayed and proceeding forward

One of my favorite and most memorable gymnastics meets was the Winter Challenge at Chelsea Piers Connecticut. The competition was scheduled on Valentine’s Day earlier this year and was held in Stamford, a city in Connecticut that is just over an hour outside New York City. After a lengthy, snow-filled car ride, my mom and I checked in at the tremendous hotel where a majority of the competitors were staying. I had spent the night with my friends on my team exploring, starting with the hotel’s pool, which had reeked strongly of chlorine. The rest of that night mainly consisted of dancing to loud pop music in one of the many vacant conference rooms.

As my eyes quickly scanned all the judges, one of them saluted me. I felt my hands fly into a gymnast salute. This was going to be the first year I would be competing a three series on beam. I was going to be throwing a back handspring stepout, back layout stepout, back layout stepout. I felt myself clutch the beam with my sweaty palms as I mounted. I did my turn and jump connection and surprisingly everything was going very well. I started feeling more comfortable and confident. I happily danced across the beam preparing for my series. I closed my eyes and imagined myself perfectly doing the skill. I swung my arms back beginning my back handspring, my chalky, sweaty hands hit the beam. I flew into my first layout step out and came down on the beam perfectly. I set up for my last

My bare feet pushed against the navy blue, spring boarded floor. A wide mirror, that took up nearly the entire wall, casted back the reflection of the gymnastics battling their mind sets. I faced the mirror. My coach along my side had put his arm against mu back a clear sign to throw my backhand spring. My mind rattled, as I felt the sticky, heat of sweat starting to form against my hair line. My legs trembled, the kind of trembling that is so violent you forget to breath. What if he didn't catch me? My neck breaks? If I lose trust in myself? I shook myself from the thoughts. I needed something to control the chaos that was controlling my mind. I breathed in. A big gust of sweat bombarded my lungs. To most this smell was of great displeasure, but to me it was blanket of comfort. The loss in mind set only wasted a few seconds. I felt the courage boost back up, as I began to squat. Next my arms started to swing, and after that quick moment I was off the ground. I had no interest in landing, but just like that I was on my feet. A smile formed on my coach's face, and his claps sounded like triumph. With this achievement I wanted to throw so badly on my own. I licked the few, salty