When McKenzie learned that she would need to repeat level 7 because of her accident during the summer, she was obviously devastated. But the silver lining that kept her motivated was telling herself that if she was going to repeat level 7, then she might as well make a splash. She wanted to go back to regionals and dominate. One medal last year was not enough, she wanted to do even better this year. The season didn't go as smoothly as she would have liked, and even qualifying at the state meet was an absolute roller coaster of emotions, but she made it back. At regionals they divide up all of the qualifying girls by age, and it meant that McKenzie was in the very first session of the weekend. It was early and the pill wouldn't smile for me!
March in. Lots of girls, lots of gyms.
Last year she had to compete alone, but this year Izzy was also in her rotation.
The girls started on beam, which is stressful for me, but they seem to like it because then it's out of the way. McKenzie had a solid routine and scored an 8.9. It was a fabulous way to start the meet.
They rotated to floor next. McKenzie has completely changed her tumbling passes since state and I haven't seen them yet. She was excited about the changes and I was excited to see them. They looked so good! She simply looked like she was having a blast out there. Even better, she scored a 9.3. This was going very well so far.
She was nervous about vault because it hadn't felt very solid this past week, but even feeling a little weak she pulled off a 9.275. All that was left was bars. Unlike state, this went off without a hitch and she scored 8.925. That all-around score is 36.4! She has never scored that high in her entire gymnastics career! She was on cloud nine as she realized that she just had the meet of her life. We watched and waited to see if she'd come home with any medals for that amazing performance. She came home with five! She took 6th on vault, 6th on bars, 7th on beam, 9th on floor, and 7th all-around. I would say that her dream of coming back to regionals and dominating was just fulfilled.
Look at all that bling!
She was on a high the rest of the weekend, which was great because the gymnastics was just getting started. We stayed to watch every one of her friend's sessions, that was five gymnastics meets in all, 21 hours in the gym. We watched everyone have moments of amazement and everyone have moments that were tough. But these girls are always there for each other. I think that was one of my favorite parts of the weekend, watching these girls support each other through it all. Being alone out there is hard, and they made sure no one felt alone.
A little bit of fun mixed in. The girls did a 360 picture which was hilarious to watch but turned out great.
Lots of giant Uno at the hotel between sessions.
An escape room the final night. They failed miserably but had a blast doing it.
We are hoping to ride this incredible momentum into next season. I can't wait to see what these girls can do.
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