I find it somewhat amusing that at this point in the season, we have now worn pink just as much as we've worn crimson! Haha. So for those of you who didn't know, the LSU meet was our third pink meet and it happened to also be their largest crowd ever for a gymnastics meet!
We had such a fun weekend in Baton Rouge...well day and a half I guess:) The night before the meet after getting to the hotel, a bunch of us had our nightly "Friends" Marathon. We're a all complete diehard fans, but Brittany and Kayla have taken "addict" to a whole new level! I have never heard anybody quote something like the two of them do "Friends!" Haha so we had tons of fun and laughed a solid three hours straight!
The following day after a pretty laid back and relaxing morning we headed over to the Maravich Center ready for business. Coming off of a break last weekend, and having been at home the past two competitions, we knew we had to get back into the swing of competition on the road. Several of the girls were able to debut new skills and for the most part they were all very successful. We began the night on bars with solid routines, a few little mistakes, but had to deal with inconsistent scores...again:) It's a good thing we're getting good at blocking them out so we don't lose our focus and momentum! On vault Ricki nearly stuck her brand new yurchennko 1 1/2. It was an amazing vault, especially for such a tiny person! Kassi also came out with a new vault, a layout arabian, and it was absolutely gorgeous! Not only are both their vaults better, it just adds variety to the line up which is nice to see.
At this point of the meet we found ourselves nearly four tenths behind LSU after giving up particularly valuable tenths on landings, but we were determined to dig ourselves out of the hole. On floor Ricki led us off with a near flawless routine to really get us fired up. Brittany, Kaitlin, and Casey had awesome routines to keep the ball rolling, setting Kassi and Morgan up perfectly. I think the highlight of the meet for me was hearing the crowd respond to Morgan's routine. LSU fans are extremely loyal and they aren't afraid to show it. So it was unbelievable to hear them go crazy and cheer for Morgan throughout her entire floor routine. You know you're good when you're able to get the LSU student section involved:) haha
Even after six awesome floor sets, we still sat a couple tenths behind the Tigers. Sarah pulled us all together and told us to take advantage of the underdog position and use this situation to help us down the road. We knew that we could very well find ourselves sitting in a similar setting at SECs or Nationals so this was perfect practice. I felt like the second she told us that, the attitude completely changed. During the first three events, we were there in LSU's house looking scared and timid. At this point, we made it our house and did our job. Brittany led us off with an impeccable routine for a 9.875. Then the next four, Casey, Amanda, Ricki, and Kassi, all rocked their routines as well. So we had five solid, respectable scores in the bag with Morgan left to go. She had an amazing routine going and got a little tripped up on the new straddle jump. Haha That's Mo for ya, she does all her huge tumbling with ease and then falls on a leap! haha...no worries, she assured us it won't happen again:)
Well that exceptional beam rotation brought our team score to another 196.3 and a win over the Tigers. It was a great way to finish out the meet and just showed us how you can't EVER give up, you have to find until the very end! I felt like a lot of our problems came from just being a little rusty from the off weekend. It was nice to have a break but we never really picked up the intensity enough in workout the week prior to the meet.
So we're back in Tuscaloosa training hard. On Sunday we got to enjoy a shortened practice and then had the Tide Tyke kids come to the gym for a few hours of games and crafts and fun! It was great to interact with the kids and see their eyes light up when they stepped foot into the gym. It was another opportunity to give back to the community and make an impact. So we're all psyched for this weekend as we take on the Florida Gators back at home!! This will be one heck of a meet so don't miss out!!! ROLL TIDE!!!
