Reaching for Gold

[Antione Hoefflin]

Wake up!
Cara-Jean Kitchi
Elizabeth Toman
Fionn Paquet
Gavriila Shahar
Ingrid Skoglund
Serenity Oliver
Stefan Eder

Coach Antione Hoefflin always arrived at the studio well and truly before it was time for his gymnasts to arrive, as he could make sure that everything was as it should be and so the door would be unlocked and the lights on if any of the kids arrived early. It also gave him a chance to work out and polish up on his skills.

He was however in his office when the teenagers did start arriving and he remained where he was, drinking his third cup of coffee, as the kids went through their warm-ups, and it gave the ones who liked talking a chance to get it out of their systems before it was time to get to work.

At fifteen minutes after six, he strolled out of his office, clipboard in hand, and looked at the teenagers. With a quick smile he looked at the clipboard. "Paquet; vault! Edar; Rings! Shahar; floor! Toman, vault! Oliver; bars! Kitchi; low beam! New girl; beam!" Yes, everyone else got their last name, Ingrid got new girl; which would tell some that she had something still to prove, though in reality it just meant that the coach wanted to remind her that she was new girl.

He nodded to the assistant coaches who moved over to stand by the uneven bars and rings and he walked to stand guard over the two vaults, though he positioned himself so that he could see the entire studio as well.

[Cara-Jean Kitchi]

Cara lived for the morning training sessions, they were her chance to really feel alive, which wasn't saying much since she wasn't allowed to train properly until she had been given the all clear from the therapist, and she didn't dare ask the woman how much more she had to gain until she got that.

After showering and getting dressed in her team uniform - even off the team she dressed in the required uniform until told otherwise. She then slipped her feet into her sport's shoes, grabbed the bag and headed to the gym.

Walking into the studio, she left the bag and shoes on the bench against the side of the room and walked over to the mat and began her well rehearsed warm up. She kept her head down as the others arrived, just concentrating on warming up each group of muscles.

When the coach came out and called out their assigned apparatus, her eyes flickered around the room and landed on the new person who would be working on the proper-sized beam. Rolling backwards, she found her feet and walked over to where the beams were, after chalking up her hands and feet, she walked over to stand beside the low beam, what she was going to do already working through her head. Low beam or otherwise, she was going to do a proper routine. Folding at the hips, she placed her hands on the beam, just narrower than shoulder-width and prepared to do her mount.

[Elizabeth Toman]

The fact that she now had a roommate didn't even cross Libby's mind as her alarm started blaring at five thirty in the morning. Rolling off the bed, she grabbed what she needed from beside the bed and walked into the bathroom to get dressed, there was a chance she closed the door a little harder than expected.

Once her uniform was in place and she'd tied her hair back into a high ponytail, she began applying the make-up and glitter. As soon as she was happy with her look, she left the room and House and made her way to the gym and studio. She rolled her eyes to see that Cara was already there. When was the girl going to take a hint and just give up already? Without saying anything, she went into her warm-ups and waited patiently for their coach to tell them to get started.

She gave a pained whimper when he told her the vault, but she knew better than to ask why she couldn't work on the bars; her best apparatus, and jumping to her feet she stalked over to the vault, shooting daggers at Finn and chalked her hands and feet. She then walked to the end of the runway and looked at Finn once again, shooting him a challenging grin. If she was going to run against a boy, she could at least make it a little fun.

[Fionn Paquet]

Finn stretched as his alarm went off and after flicking the light on, he unceremoniously rolled out of bed.

It didn't take him long to get ready, after all he was a guy, and after a quick swipe through his hair with some gel, he grabbed his bag and made his way out of the House and toward the gym. He had often thought of dropping gymnastics, but it was so much a part of his life, it was him he'd let down if he dropped it, not his father. Though he had no doubt the congressman would tear him up one side and down the other if he even thought about making the Paquet family look bad.

He slipped into warming up easily and turned his attention to the coach when the man came out and started barking out his orders, a smile curved his mouth as he wondered what the coach was like with the women he dated; did he know how to talk without barking?

Jumping to his feet, he sauntered over to the vault, happily annoying the team captain with his peppiness, and he returned Libby's smile with arched eyebrows as he chalked up his hands and feet. If she wanted a challenge he'd give her one. He stood at the end of the runway and bounced on the spot as he settled on a vault.

[Serenity Oliver]

Serenity's eyes blinked open, it was hard to tell if she had been woken by the cat headbutting her chin or the phone buzzing under her pillow, either way, she slipped soundlessly out of bed and headed into the bathroom, always conscious of the fact that another girl lived in the room.

As soon as she was dressed and ready to go, she grabbed her bag and shoes and left the room and then the House. Jogging to the gymnasium, she slipped into the studio, left her things tidily on the bench and headed over to join the others with the warm-up.

When they were given their assignments she couldn't help but pull a face. While the bars weren't her worst event, they also weren't her best, but at least she wasn't on the vault, as the Coach always seemed to ride her hard on the vault and rather than getting better, she seemed to get worse when he was watching her!

She rose to her feet and walked over to the uneven bars, a number of different things of what she could do going through her head. With a shrug, she chalked her hands, pulled her grips on, chalked up again and then moved the springboard to where she wanted it. She knew that her warden would move it once she had started the routine, but she liked setting it up herself, because then no mistakes could be made.

[Ingrid Skoglund]

Ingrid's alarm clock went off at 4:30am. She didn't care if she woke her roommate. She dressed quickly into her running clothes and was out the door by 4:45. Her backpack contained all her usual school supplies plus her gymnastics team uniform and riding clothes. It weighed in at just over 8.2 pounds to simulate the weight of her rifle. She could change into her team uniform later as coach would probably not be too happy with her walking in wearing a sweaty leotard. She still hadn't decided if it was worth it to push her alarm clock back to 4am just so she could make the full twenty kilometers she usually ran. Even though she gave herself an hour to run, she only needed fifty-five minutes. The first day of gymnastics training had her pumped.

Her run ended at the gymnasium, and Ingrid ducked inside to make the most of what little downtime she had. She cooled herself down and changed into the team uniform. Coach did not need to know about her running and constant biathlon training. She pulled her hair into a tight bun and headed into the studio with some time to spare. If 100 seconds counted as spare time. Unsurprisingly, the team was mostly girls with a couple guys. She didn't bother with introductions particularly before practice. That time was best spent warming up and getting herself in the right frame of mind.

The coach gave directions, and Ingrid did her best to place names with faces. She really didn't care what the coach called her. At least 'new girl' was an accurate description. Her old coach in Norway had a fondness of calling all his gymnasts 'sofagris'¹ when he thought they weren't trying hard enough. She jogged over to the beam and considered the sort of routine she wanted to work on. From experience, Ingrid liked to focus on one part of a routine such as a single skill she hadn't yet mastered. Twists were by far her weakest point, but her first training session didn't seem like the best time to practice. She could always work on transitions and making each skill blend from one into the other.

Ingrid quickly sized up the small girl next to her. Gymnastics was obvious the only sport available to her. The coach had called her Kitchi, but Ingrid thought 'Liten Reke'² was a better name. The Norwegian mounted the beam without any fanfare.

¹couch potato, lit. sofa grease
²Little Shrimp

[Stefan Eder]

Kai woke up a minute before his alarm went off, blinking awake and immediately glancing at the red numbers. He reached out automatically to turn it off, preventing the alarm from even sounding, and then rolled out of bed in the darkness, heading to the bathroom, which he always left a dim night-light burning in. The dim light was enough for him to brush his teeth and get ready, dressing in the team suit and then shrugging on the jacket. He stepped into his barn boots, then grabbed his gym bag and left the room.

After half an hour in the barn, in which he skipped out Lupus' stall and then brought the mare in for her breakfast, Kai left the barn again and headed to the gym, stepping out of his boots and carrying them inside the studio so that he didn't leave any dirty tracks. He stepped out of his track pants and shed his jacket, then headed to the floor to stretch, sitting down a ways from everyone else and focusing on his work. Sure, he enjoyed spending time with (most of) the gymnasts outside of training too, but training was just for training, not for talking.

After fifteen minutes, the coach walked in from his office, and Kai listened for his name, grinning as he heard his best apparatus. He bounced up and headed to the rings, smiling at the assistant coach who was there, “Be warned, I need to work on my dismounts today.” The rest of the routine too, but the dismounts especially, so he'd be hammering those that day.

[Antione Hoefflin]

Ant crossed his arms as he watched the gymnasts prepare their routines, he leaned back slightly to give the appearance that he was completely at ease. "I don't care that you are in a studio." He said as he looked around. "I want you to work on you weak points and to pretend that you are being watched by the toughest judge out there, who is going to deduct points from your score if they think you're not breathing properly!" Sure, no judge actually did that, but there had been a few during his career that he was sure they would have if they could, and then found the most stupid thing to remove a point from because they couldn't take it off for any other reason; he hated those judges.

He looked at the two gymnasts he was supervising. "Just a warning, if you both decide to do a stunt that will break your neck, I'm only going to be able to save one of you, and no offense, but Toman will be the lucky one." He gave a grin, nothing more than a quick flash of teeth to show that he was only half serious, though it was up to the teenagers to work out what half he was serious on.

[Cara-Jean Kitchi]

Cara nodded as the coach's words washed over her, with her hands on the beam, just narrower than shoulder-width, she blocked everything else out other than her routine and went into a press to handstand, moved her legs into the splits and did a full turn, lowered herself to a clear pike support (after the full turn, she straightened her legs, then piked them between her arms and moved her body through so that she had moved her hips above the beam and supported herself with her arms before swinging her legs back through her arms so that she was standing on the beam and moved into a squat), she then did a triple turn in tuckstand, then went onto a tucked Arabian back handspring (to turn herself around), followed instantly by a back handspring. She then did two back handsprings, finishing in a scale, a layout full (stretched salto with a full turn) then a Korbut.

Next came a front Aerial, Grigoras, Back Pike and Straddle Full. A Double Turn in arabesque. Switch Ring, Layout Step-Out, Tucked Full, Back Tuck and a Sheep Jump. Sissone to a Split Jump. She then paused a moment as she shook her head to clear it, knowing that she was pushing herself too hard, but also knowing that she needed to finish, then bounded forward to complete the routine with a round off and a Gainer stretched back salto with a triple twist, off the side of the beam, bending her knees just enough, and then straightened up with her arms in the air.

She closed her eyes against the pounding in her head, hoping to dispell the spots that were dancing in her vision as she sank to her knees to catch her breath and go over the routine to work out what needed to be worked on.

[Elizabeth Toman]

Libby rolled her eyes at the coach's words. It was vault, what skill could she possibly focus on? Her run up? Yeah, that was done no matter the trick that followed. Her landing? Oh, yeah, covered with no matter what she chose to do. Rolling her shoulders, she bounced on the spot and came to a stop as she listened to his next words. "Great to see you have such strong faith in me, Coach!" She said with a bright smile. "I promise to try my hardest not to break my neck. Finn there might need your help though." She gave him a grin too as she blew a kiss in the other gymnast's direction. "Catch you on the flip side!" With an air-kiss, she blew out a breath and powered down the run way.

Half way to the spring board, she had her mind settled on a Yurchenkos with a half-on (half twist in pre-flight). Going into a handspring, she twisted her body around so that by the time her feet pushed off into the springboard, she was facing the runway, with another half twist, she pushed off the table and went into a pike back salto (a Khorkina) and landed on the mat. However, when she landed she had straightened from the pike properly and still had too much momentum to stick her landing, and even with a hop, she still ended up on her face. With a muffled scream, she pushed herself up, slammed her hands into the mat, rose to her feet and walked back to the start of the run way.

[Fionn Paquet]

Finn nodded, the man's words were sound advice, and Finn knew that he needed to work on his Yurchenko vaults, as the first handspring tended to be what cost him the points. His eyes widened at the man's next words. "Don't worry, Sir." He said with a cocky grin as he blew a kiss right back to Libby. "I have no intention of breaking my neck, not today anyway." He arched an eyebrow at the girl's comment. "Not if I get there first." He retorted as he too started down the runway.

Going into the handspring, he did a half twist before he was in the handstand part of the element and pushed off the mat. His feet his the springboard and he pushed off with enough force to give himself the height to to the vault he'd picked, called a Melissanidis 2 - after pushing off the table, he moved his hands to his side, piked his legs and did a double backward salto. He straightened up just as his feet touched the ground and with a simple step forward he pumped his fist into the air. "You ok?" He asked Libby, who it seemed had eaten mat. Though he held is hands in the air and followed her example of walking back to the start of the runway.

[Serenity Oliver]

Serenity shrugged, only having to focus on what they felt needed the work was a lot easier than trying to work an entire routine. "I'm going to work on transitions and dismounts." She told the assistant coach. With a smile, she walked forward and removed the springboard.

Standing by the low bar she bounced into the air and mounted with a simple glide kip, then cast to stand on the low bar and a jump to hang on the high bar. A couple of giants, the second one with a half turn so that she was facing the low bar.

There were times during training where she wished that she'd put as much into gymnastics as the other girls in the room, that she'd moved her skills beyond the third level, but then she just didn't care. There was so much more to life than going from competition to competition and trying to outdo yourself every single time, the mare thought of it made her feel drained. So, keeping it simple, she just worked on a rotation of transition moves: Stalder with grip change to hang on low bar, toe-on release with counter movement to high bar, clear hip release with counter movement to high bar and swing backwards to straddle flight to handstand. She didn't get all of them, though the ones she missed, she just picked herself back up and went back into it.

[Ingrid Skoglund]

Somehow it was no surprise that coach wanted them to work on their weakest points. For Ingrid, that was pretty much guaranteed that she would have to practice twists. Sure, coach didn't know that she wasn't good at them, but clearly he trusted his gymnasts enough to be honest with themselves. She grimaced and took a deep breath. She didn't really have a routine to work on that incorporated twists. After all, doing stuff she was good at would be a waste of time for today.

Ingrid gave herself a couple steps running start and jumped straight into a half twist with a salto back tucked. As soon as her feet touched the beam, she could feel herself out of balance. She wobbled hard for a few seconds before falling off. Okay, so maybe that was a little ambitious. Undeterred, Ingrid hopped back up on the beam to try again. She tried the same skill only going the opposite direction. It wasn't so much that the twist itself was bad, but she couldn't stick the move at all. One foot landed on the beam, but the other slipped off the edge and the rest of the girl was quick to follow.

Third time the charm? The Norwegian hopped back up onto the beam and took a deep breath to calm herself. Just as she couldn't shoot when stressed, sticking a move while stressed would be much harder. The girl focused on each part of the skill. Jump, just one twist, back, and get both feet in line. For a brief moment, the girl thought she had it, but on the exhale of a breath she didn't know she was holding, Ingrid fell off the beam. She landed hard and winced as a flash of pain shot up her shoulder. Shaking her head, the girl hopped back up determined to get the move down at least once before the training session was over.

[Stefan Eder]

Kai nodded to himself as he heard the coach telling them that they should be working on their weak points for that session. It was nothing less than what he'd planned, and then the next practice where he got onto the rings, he could try and throw it all together and find the weak points after some rigorous work on dismounts.

After getting a boost up onto the rings from the assistant coach, Kai used the first few minutes for a bit of a warmup. Sure, he could start flinging himself off of the rings, but that wasn't how a real dismount would go either. However, after a few movements, he felt ready, and he let himself swing out of the inverted cross, launching almost upwards on the circle as he released his hands. The Balabanov required some height for its maneuver, a double salto forward in the piked position, including half a twist, before one landed on the mat. However, it appeared that Kai had misjudged his timing enough to make the full twist, and he landed on his rump on the mats, before he rose again, chuckling, “Display A of why I need to work on this.” He adjusted his grips and then nodded to the assistant coach, letting himself be boosted back up so that he could try that again.

[Antione Hoefflin]

Ant watched the banter between the two gymnasts at the vault and arched an eyebrow, though he didn;t say anything as he seemed to watch everyone who didn't have an assistant coach at their side. "Kitchi! Use the floor beam and work on the verticals of your handstands, you're not reaching them before you finish the move! New Girl, you've been downgraded to the low beam until you sort your balance out! Toman! Just because a joke about you breaking your neck, doesn't mean you can call me on it. A pike means your legs are already straight, focus on your landing before you straighten the rest of your body! Paquet! Your Yurchenko is looking better! And this is why we have training!

After giving the gymnasts another half hour on the apparatus they were working on, he released a whistle to bring the attention to him before they went into more movements. Paquet; Rings! Edar; Vault! Shahar; Beam! Toman, Bars! Oliver; Vault! Kitchi; Remain where you are! New girl; Vault! He knew that they wouldn't be able to do anymore apparatuses that morning, as he'd need to get them to start their cool downs soon enough, but he'd get them through as much as possible in the time that he had them in the mornings and that afternoon, they'd just work on what they hadn't that morning.