This weekend will be quite an adventure for the Arizona women’s gymnastics team as they embark on a tricky double meet.
The No. 20 Gymcats will take on Wisconsin-Stout and Brown in McKale tonight at 7 p.m., and then it’s off to Dallas to compete against Texas Woman’s University.
Like always, the Gymcats hope to put up scores that will compete nationally and improve their rank, but more than anything the ladies are eager to throw together a complete meet.
“”As a team, we haven’t really hit all four events yet and we’d really like to do that,”” Briana Bergeson said during Thursday’s practice, “”I know we could get 49’s on all events. We’re totally capable of that, we just haven’t achieved it yet.””
UA head coach Bill Ryden commented on the team’s goals as well, saying, “”Our goal would obviously be going 24 for 24, not counting any falls. Second to that, we at least need to count five good to great routines on every event and not have that weakness.””
As for the complexity of having two meets this weekend instead of the usual one, the athletes have mixed feelings about the challenge.
“”I think it’s going to be really cool,”” Bergeson said. “”We’ve never competed in two meets before, so we’ll see how it goes.””
Senior Breanne Workman felt a little bit different on the task at hand saying, “”I would like to say (that I’m not nervous) and that I just take it meet by meet but it’s a little stressful just because I’ve never competed twice in one weekend before, other than when I was little.””
“”But when you’re younger your body bounces back a little quicker,”” she added, “”so I’m going to try hard not to think about it and take each meet one at a time.””
In preparation for the weekend, Ryden admits he took it a bit easier on his athletes this week in practice.
“”It can’t be pressure, pressure, pressure 24/7, or they’d fry,”” Ryden said. “”There’s only so much their bodies can take, so at some point I just have to take it easy on them and give them some time to just be girls.””
Assistant coach Colleen Johnson agreed with Ryden’s approach this week.
“”No one is hurt too bad to where they’ll have to sit out,”” she said. “”It’s just bumps and bruises that come along with mid-season. We couldn’t pound on them too hard this week, but we obviously have to maintain a high level of their training.””
Other than cutting back on the intensity of practice for this weekend, the Gymcats look to make a few small changes to up their scores.
“”We actually changed a few of Beamer’s routines so she doesn’t have to try to be so perfect every time,”” Ryden said, “”She was trying to be so perfect, and then she was missing. So we are giving her a sort of bigger window of error so she can just be more aggressive in general. She is much happier with this bar routine and we’ll try it out in the meets.””
Johnson said those changes have made Bergeson the most confident she’s been in awhile.
That being said, Johnson is fully confident in her beam workers, and the rest of the team for that matter.
“”We need to leave our past mistakes behind,”” Johnson said, “”we’ve fixed them in the gym, and now the sky is the limit.””
