PUHI — Starting Wednesday, the Kauai Gymnastics Academy will be closed while Jack and Kay Leonard accompany a select group of gymnasts to the Mega Meet in Las Vegas.
“This is exciting,” said Mark Bonilla, one of the Kauai Gymnastics Academy instructors. “I’ve never been to Las Vegas in my life. This is the first time I’m going there.”
Eleven Kauai Gymnastics Academy gymnasts have been named to the two teams participating in the 2018 Las Vegas Mega Meet, which is a multi-discipline gymnastics meet to be contested March 2-4 at the Westgate Las Vegas Resort &Casino hosted by the Fallbrook Gymnastics Club.
“This is the third year for the Level 8 gymnasts, and the second year for the Level 6 gymnasts,” said Jack Leonard, owner and instructor of Kauai Gymnastics Academy. “There are more than 1,000 gymnasts coming from 16 states and Canada. For us, the Level 6 and 8 gymnasts will be defending their team titles and have been training very hard.”
Level 6 gymnasts include Hi‘ilawe Banasihan, Savannah Hubbard, Madison Hubbard, Kamaile Manibog, Madison Welsh and Haley Zina.
Level 8 gymnasts include Lani Johnson, also an instructor with Kauai Gymnastics Academy and a charter gymnast from the inception of Kauai Gymnastics Academy in Puhi, Ashlyn Questin, Ashley Ricciardi, Mia Ricciardi and Angela-Rhey Ventura.
“I’m just taping it very hard,” Ventura said, while binding support tape around an injured finger. “I just have to go to this Las Vegas meet. When I injured my finger, it kept me from cooking at the American Culinary Federation breakfast. But if I tape it hard, I should be able to make it through this.”
The Mega Meet gymnasts were selected ahead of the academy’s annual Holiday Showcase in December. During the showcase at the Kukui Grove Center, they had already begun to show some of the routines they were working on for the Las Vegas meet.
“We can do the zipper effect,” the group chorused, lining up on two sides of the spring floor system and then, at a count, performing backflips simultaneously while showing off their new competition leotards and warm-ups.
“We’ve come a long way,” Leonard said. “When we first started, only three of them could backflip. Now, they can all do it — and do it together.”
Kauai Gymnastics Academy re-opens after the group returns March 17.
