Gymnasts display routine poise
Weekend event draws 1,200 competitors to CdA
Coach Rachael Tart high-fives gymnast Tessa DePasquale after her routine on the uneven parallel bars Saturday. (Jesse Tinsley / The Spokesman-Review)
David Adlard’s voice boomed on the microphone as girls in gymnastics uniforms pranced through the haze from a smoke machine and carried their team flags into the middle of the room to begin yet another round of competition.
“This is probably the most fun gymnastics meet that they will attend in their careers,” said Adlard, the meet’s director, who in 1995 founded Funtastics Gymnastics in Coeur d’Alene with his wife, Lisa. “We try to do a lot for the kids … and put on a real show.”
The eighth Great West Gym Fest attracted about 1,200 competitors and more than 4,000 coaches and parents to the Coeur d’Alene Resort. The meet started Friday and will end Monday.
The competition includes girls ages 7 to 18, who compete against girls with the same skill levels, ranked from 5 to 10. Some girls came from as far as Texas and Arizona to compete at level 10, which requires the skills to compete in college or beyond, Lisa Adlard said.
In past years, the meet included a boys competition at North Idaho College, but the school had a conflict this weekend.
“The biggest thing about our meet at the resort is that it’s kind of a destination. Families can go up to their room or come down and watch the competition,” Lisa Adlard said. “It’s something the entire family can enjoy.”
Rachael Tart has been coaching gymnastics for about eight years after competing for a dozen years. She works with about 40 girls at Funtastics. “When I see them smile – when they accomplish what they want to do, that’s when you see the payoff,” Tart said.
Karen LaRue, of Hayden Lake, attended the meet to watch her granddaughter, 7-year-old Zoey LaRue, who competes at level 7.
“She trains a lot, about 20 hours a week,” LaRue said. “She loves it. It’s fulfilling for me because she sees something that she wants to do and accomplishes it.”
On Saturday, Zoey LaRue won her vault competition and finished fourth in the floor routine and sixth in both the uneven bars and the balance beam. “I want to be a level 10,” she said. “My favorite event is the bars, because I do good on it.”
She started gymnastics when she was 3. “I was really wild and running around the house,” she said, “and my parents thought it was good idea.”