NESA Students Win Titles at Gymnastic Championships

The following was submitted by Uma Adhav, a parent of a Paul Hanlon School student in Westwood. 

While many Massachusetts students were vacationing last week, one small group of dedicated athletes won a number of national titles at the 2012 Group Championships at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

The New England Sports Academy Rhythmic Gymnastic (RG) Stars Beginner group, including team members Antara Adhav, Berwin Lan, Emily Liu, Anna Dushanin and Nonna Grigoryan, finished first all-around in the Junior Olympic category with a score of 21.300, earning first on ball (11.750) and second on floor (9.550).

Antara, Berwin and Emily are Westwood residents and students at and respectively.

The NESA RG Stars 2 Intermediate Group, including team members Isabella Vina, Rebecca Ju, Katherine Merport and Anastasia Sakhanowsky took the National title landing first all-around in the Junior Olympic category with an all around score of 33.950, earning first on hoop (17.700) and second on floor (16.250).

The NESA Ruby Stars, Second Beginner group, including Ashleigh Woolf, Claudia Woolf, Lauren Lan, Michelle Li and Caitlyn Wei finished third in the ball routine.

All three teams are coached by Varduhi Nahapetyan and assistant coach, Marina Bekker. Nahapetyan, a three time National Rhythmic Champion from Armenia, began her coaching career in the United States in 2003 and since then the NESA Rhythmic Stars team has won many individual and group national championships.

Bekker is a three times Massachusetts Rhythmic Gymnastics Champion herself. Rhythmic gymnastics is a unique combination of dance, ballet and art, interlaced with gymnastics. It is a sport that harmonizes body movement with grace and beauty of dance and music, while manipulating one of five types of apparatus – ball, hoop, rope, ribbon and clubs. Rhythmic gymnastics is a very challenging sport that tests the strength, rhythm, balance, flexibility and agility of the gymnast. 

After coming back from Colorado Springs, all girls have been vigorously getting ready for the Rhythmic Gymnastics State Championship.

The Massachusetts State competition will be held on March 3-4, 2012 at the Shady Hill School in Cambridge. Also, everyone on the team is looking forward to the National Competition in June at the ESPN center in Orlando, Florida.