Ignite Gymnastics of Ignacio competed at the Xcel Gold state meet with 50 teams and more than 400 athletes at Xtreme Athletics in Lafayette last weekend. Four Ignite athletes performed well enough to qualify for the upcoming Region 3 championships, up from one last year.
“Ignite gymnasts handled the pressure well,” said coach Liz Herring, noting that several athletes overcame miscues to advance.
Aubrianna Foutz, 11, Koralea Brown, 11, Laeliana Shubert, 13, and Samantha Riddell, 14, all qualified for the Region 3 championships where they’ll compete with gold gymnasts from seven states including Texas, Arkansas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Kansas, Wyoming and Colorado. Active Athletics of Colorado will host this year’s regional meet at the Arapahoe County Fairgrounds, May 13-15.
Foutz led the team at the state meet, scoring a 9.625 on the bars to win a silver medal. Foutz also placed eighth on beam, 10th on vault and eighth all around in the youth age group. “Aubrianna was very consistent and performed with only slight errors,” Herring said. “Her and Koralea were in one of the toughest, high-scoring age groups.”
Brown placed 11th on beam and 12th on floor.
“Koralea's wrists hit the bar when she did the jump from low bar to high bar, but she slid her hands down and held on and continued like a pro,” Herring said.
Riddell placed seventh on balance beam, ninth on vault, 12th on bars and 12th all-around in the senior age group.
“Samantha is a joy to coach and quickly made friends with the girls in her squad,” Herring said. “They made all of us coaches proud by encouraging and yelling for each other through the whole meet.”
Shubert had her best result on the beam, placing 12th.
“Laeliana is usually very good at vault but had an off vault day (which was her first event),” Herring said. “But she put it behind her quickly and proceeded to have one of her best meets on the other events.”
The gymnasts had to post an all-around score of at least 34.00 to qualify for the state meet. Ignite attended five regular season meets, placing second as a team in Los Alamos, New Mexico, and fourth in Grand Junction.
Foutz also won all-around titles in Los Alamos and Belen, New Mexico, and finished with a bronze in Santa Fe and Grand Junction.
Riddell won an all-around silver in Los Alamos.
Brown won all-around bronze in Belen, and Shubert won all-around bronze in Los Alamos. The team also had several individual event champions through the season.
Next, the gymnasts will show their moves on the regional stage.
Eden Krokos was Ignite’s lone regional qualifier last year. She placed 12th all-around in her division.
