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Bobcat gymnasts take second at district championship
The Battlefield Bobcats came within a whisker of stunning perennial favorite Osbourn Park last week, coming in second behind the Yellow Jackets, 146.475 to 146.05, at the Cedar Run District gymnastics championship.Despite the silver showing, Battlefield advances as a team to the Northwest Regional tournament with an all-star cast featuring two of the top four all-around competitors in the Cedar Run District.
The trip to regions extracted revenge against 2008 regional qualifier Loudoun Valley, which came in third (138.45). Host Stonewall Jackson earned fourth place (98.15), though senior Meghan Hammel earned an individual trip to regions for her floor routine.
Erin Turner led the way for Battlefield with a total score of 37.8 points, good for second place in the competition.
She earned second or third place in all four events, usually placing behind all-around champion Megan McDonald (38.375) of OP. Her low mark of the day came on the balance beam where she scored a 9.3. But even that gave her a No. 3 finish.
Turner also garnered the highest solo score of the day for Battlefield as she pulled off a 9.6 on the floor, topping freshman teammate Alex Fairbanks by only 0.05 points.
While that normally would secure a win, McDonald crushed in that event with what was only her second-best score of the day: a 9.7. McDonald had also earned a meet-high 9.8 on bars.
Meanwhile, junior Bobcat Mandy Brown (37.0) returned to form is a strong way, pulling off a fourth-place finish in the all-around. Her 9.55 on the balance beam was one of only five scores to break the 9.0 threshold in that event and put her in second place.
However, the team-leading score also launched Battlefield to one of its two individual event titles, as the Bobcats bested OP 36.2 to 35.95 then, and 37.5 to 36.375 on the floor.
Battlefield and Osbourn Park gymnasts combined for 22 out of 27 scores of 9.0 or higher on the day, with each school totaling 11.
Though all-around competitors Turner and Brown each crossed that mark four times, and Fairbanks did so twice, Becca Saran cruised on the floor to the tune of a 9.225. That gave her a seventh-place finish and would have qualified her for regions even if the team had not been eligible as a whole.
Fellow Bobcat Tandeece Maxloum would have done the same, as she knotted two top-eight finishes of her own for bars (sixth, 8.825) and beam (eighth, 8.9).
As for Stonewall, Hammel will be making the trip to regions solo this year thanks to her 9.25 on the floor.
Hammel’s all-around total of 34.7 is less than usual as she is capable of scoring above a 9.0 in each event, though it was in line with her 34.625 score at the Aloha Classic Invitational last month. Even the Stonewall overall team score was lower than normal.
“They were training really hard, they were trying to do their new skills, and they just took them out and didn’t do them tonight,” said coach Amy Romberger. “But they played it safe, and that’s okay; I understand.”
Notably absent from the meet was rising star Meghan Poole. Though the freshman did not compete, she may have a shot to make it to regions next year like Hammel and former standout Kelsey Dietz have done for Stonewall in years past. She returned to gymnastics this season after taking a one-year hiatus from club training.
“For a gymnast that was out for that long, it was incredible the skills that she was putting into her routine, so I was very pleased,” said Romberger.
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