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Post by jamie manlow on Jul 17, 2009 19:44:15 GMT
The weather outside was just perfect and yet Jamie was stuck inside the gym. Since it was, after all, the beginning of competition season and she needed to be in the best shape of her life if she wanted to cut it. So, she was inside the gymnasium doing some training without any coaches since she performed best when not being watched by them. Funny, she performed her best when they weren't there but under their scrutinizing eyes she tended to screw up, even in competition. That's what most people thought when they realized who she was, a.k.a. the biggest screw up of all time. When she had purposely blown the Olympic trials because she knew she couldn't do the requested flips most had thought she was under too much pressure to do good. Not many people knew the real truth since she only told all of one person, and that person had somewhat disappeared after the Olympics that year.
Her coaches at the moment didn't hold her mess up as a sixteen year old against her because they thought it was out of her control. At least they didn't badger her on every mistake or make her do laps if she accidentally did an extra twist in her flips. No, they would only make her do the routine again and again until she got it right. On top of those days of training she tended to spend some time by herself training, stretching, etc. The more practice she had the better she would be. If she didn't practice as much as she did she would fall behind because her head would start getting to her, her thoughts letting her think she wasn't good enough. Those hours she dedicated to tumbling over and over again in the gym made her talents sharper.
At the moment she was stretching some more, already into her workout by an hour and a half. Her tiny little body had a light coating of sweat despite the air conditioning and her hair was sticking to the back of her neck. Standing up straight, she retied her pony tail along with adjusting her dark blue leotard before standing on the large floor exercise mat. The spring boards beneath made it a little easier to do the flips but you still needed power to get the height. Jamie had no issues with the power end of it, it was the having too much power for her own good. Being as tiny as she was meant she had to put a little more effort into the flips, sometimes putting too much which caused her to go too far out. Ever so slowly she was gaining advantage on herself and learning how to push off with just enough force so she didn't land out of the mat line. That was tough but she was doing it, thank god.
Shaking her head, she focused her green eyes on the blue mat in front of her that stretched through most of the gym. The basketball teams didn't have practice so the gymnastics equipment was left out for the day which meant tumbling practice. Taking in a slow breath, Jamie started forward in three long strided bounds, well long strides for her, before going into her tumble. A back handspring into two flips and a full twist backflip sent her right to the end of the 12 m x 12m mat. Jamie landed with just a tiny skip backwards, looking behind her to see she was still within the mats perimeter. Smiling a bit, she did some more tumbling with double backflips, tucked flips, flat out flips and even a Thomas salto even though it's banned from competition. Deciding she needed a water break, Jamie grabbed her water bottle and walked around the perimeter of the map to catch her breath, sipping her water. Tumbling felt good today, with no mistakes and landing within the mat made it even better. Smiling to herself, Jamie sipped her water bottle and set it down so she could go back to her tumbling exercise.
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Post by - - tessa phoenix ,, on Jul 17, 2009 21:22:50 GMT
Sleep.
It was a very important process of life and at the moment, a brunette was demonstrating the art of sleep as she lay upside down in her bed, hair toussled and one arm hanging over the edge. It was around seven thirty in the morning and it was evident (by the way she was laying) that she wasn't going to arouse any time soon. Not even when the sun did shone through the window and onto her pale face did she arouse from her slumber. It seemed as though nothing could wake sleeping beauty. However; when an alarm sounded in the not so distant, distance, the brunette jumped, startled at the loud noise. She fell sideways out of the bed and landed in a heap on the hard floor. A tangled mess of sheets and covers. A groan escaped her pink lips as she sat herself up, hand pressed firmly against her forehead as she attempted to untangle herself from the duvet covers.
It took several long moments for her to untangle herself, but once she was cleared, the brunette continued to sit on the floor. One hand flew up to her mouth, protesting against a yawn that clearly wanted to escape. Unfortunately it escaped and she was now the victim of watery and red, puffy eyes. Twitching her nose to one side, the sophomore stood slowly to her full height and stretched her arms upwards, towards the ceiling. It was going to be a long day - by her reckoning anyway.
Tessa shuffled across her room to the closet that held her clothes and wrapped a slender hand around the handle. Pulling it towards her chest, the nineteen year old allowed another yawn to slip out of her mouth as green eyes glanced across the neat piles of clothes in the different sections. Without looking at what she was doing, the brunette pulled out a pair of black shorts and a Hello Kitty t-shirt. Shuffling back over to her bed, she placed the clothes down on her bed and started to get changed out of her pyjama's. Once dressed she added a touch of make-up to her eyes and slipped into a pair of blue dolly type shoes with pink stars on them, before pulling her long, brown and blonde hair up into a messy sort of pony tail, fringe swept across her forehead and in her face.
Glancing over at the digital clock on the table beside her bed; the brunette pursed her lips together, grabbed her keys and shifted out of her dorm. It was still early, but she could grab a bite to eat for breakfast before settling down in her first class of the day. Skipping slightly to the canteen, the nineteen year old left the dorm building and sniffed the fresh air. For some reason the air always smelt better when it was first thing in the morning and it pleased her somewhat. Still skipping, the brunette eventually arrived at the canteen and grabbed herself a bottle of water and an apple. Placing the bottle of water under her arm and the apple in her mouth, Tessa Phoenix shoved her way out of the canteen doors and started her usual wander of the school before going to head to her first class. Today, she had no idea which direction to go in and decided to let her feet do the walking for her, instead of her head and mind. Eventually she arrived at the gymnasium and entered.
Inside, what met her dazzling green eyes was a person she didn't think she'd ever set her eyes on before. Taking a bite of her apple, the tall sophomore leaned against the wall; just inside the gymnasium, and watched the dark haired female tumble around the gym. "Well, aren't we a bit of a show off." the brunette mumbled to herself, taking another bite of her apple as she leaned more into the wall and chewed on the piece in her mouth. You could say that she was a bit of bitch.
outfit.
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Post by jamie manlow on Jul 17, 2009 21:41:40 GMT
Jamie had become so involved with tumbling she had no idea if anyone was watching. She had gone into some more of her routine of flipping and such, landing wrong on the last of the tumbles. Pain shot through her knee causing her to stumble a bit since the landing went bad and she had to walk it off. Within minutes she wasn't limping anymore and the pain had gone away for the most part so all she had to do was move out of tumbling onto something else. Well, she decided she wasn't going to do the balance beam today because that was just a pain in the ass so why not do either the vault or uneven bars. The vault was set up but Jamie wasn't one to do that without someone here because she could get killed vaulting alone. Technically she wasn't alone since Tessa had walked in but Jamie still hadn't noticed the girl.
As Jamie hopped onto the uneven bars she heard the snap of an apple being bitten into, and she swung her leg over the uneven bars to look in the direction of the sound. There stood Tessa looking a Jamie, someone Jamie had no cue about. Jamie had only met a few people recently and most were gymnasts since most of her day was spent here in the gymnasium. Something about being a show off reached her ears and Jamie quirked her head a bit. "Showoff? Try this is what I have to do in competition, I'm no showoff just training," she gave Tess a bit of a look before swinging down from the bars to get chalk and the spray bottle. Jamie took shit from absolutely no one and Tessa would not be excused of that rule. Showoff? How was training being a showoff? Obviously the girl had no idea what she was talking about and Jamie doubted she understood what she had said because Jamie's thick Irish brogue massacred most of her speech.
Climbing onto the uneven bars was easy so Jamie was up on them and fixing them to her specifications. Every gymnast liked the bars a little different, some preferred them completely dry with some chalk, others soaking wet with tons of chalk. Jamie was kind of in between, she liked them moist with a lot of chalk but sometimes she put too much chalk on them. Whatever the case she had to get it right in order to have a good round on the bars. The lower bar felt right so she jumped onto the higher bar and started her work on rubbing the chalk into the bar. Her eyes drifted up to Tessa above her, curious as to why the girl was here. "What sport do you do?" she questioned nicely, deciding to be nice instead of a bitch. Her hands continued their motions as she looked back down at the bar to make sure she was getting this right. This was a daily routine and Jamie had done it earlier but spending so much time on the exercise mat meant the bars were dry already.
Sighing once she was finished she hopped down and set everything back in place. Her hands were a bit calloused from not wearing her braces and wraps in the uneven bars. So, now she had to find out where she put her wraps to work on the uneven bars and not destroy her hands at the same time. Digging through her bag brought nothing and neither did looking through her stuff piled at the bench. "Hmm...." she glanced around for a moment, remembering her wraps were at the chalking bin. They lay beneath the bin ready to be chalked up and worn. She slid her tiny hands into the braces with ease and secured everything, rubbing her hands in the chalk. Once more she looked up at Tessa wondering why the hell she was still here if she was going to be nasty. Obviously she had woken up on the wrong side of the bed this morning since she was nasty. "I wish I could eat breakfast," she said more to herself than anything. Her strict diet meant she didn't eat in the morning until about ten or so ad then ate at one. Her diet was very strict since she couldn't eat fatty foods or any kind of candy.
Naturally she would sneak in a candy bar or something every once in awhile because the addiction was too much. If Jamie didn't stick to her diet her training would be screwed. A gymnasts body was mostly muscle with less than 5% of fat on them from all of the tumbling they did. If they weren't as fit as they were, well they wouldn't be able to do their tumbling or anything, that would lead to injuries. Jamie knew all too well about the injury end of it since she did have the old knee injury from not being in enough shape. Sighing, Jamie hopped on to the uneven bars and hung on the top bar for a minute. She didn't know exactly what she wanted to do and now that someone was watching, her mind started reeling.
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Post by - - tessa phoenix ,, on Jul 17, 2009 22:03:03 GMT
The brunette walked the darker haired female as her eyes ventured over to the vault; she needn't be a gymnast to know that attempting the vault alone could land a person in the hospital, or the morgue. Chewing her apple, she continued to watch the other female as she moved over to the uneven bars and swung her leg over. She found it slightly amusing to notice the fact that the other girl had only just realised she was there. Tessa raised her eyebrow and nodded her head ever so slightly as her lips moved in a hushed tone. Showoff. Try this is what I have to do in competition, I'm no showoff, just training. The look Jamie shot Tessa amused her to no end and she smirked casually; still eating her apple. "Well, sure." she mused, not quite clear on what she had said, an accent she had not heard before flew through the air at her.
Shrugging it off and trying to make it look as though she wasn't even the slightly bit confused by the mess of words, Tessa swallowed the current piece of apple in her mouth and took another small bite of it. Watching as Jamie climbed still. Gymnastic looked kind of hard to Tessa, but she had been one when she was around seven years old; giving up at the age of eleven to take up something a lot more interesting. Prehaps if she had stayed with gymnastics; she would understand the fundamentals a tad bit better than she did now. What sport do you do? It took a few moments for her to fully understand the question; that accent now annoying her more. However, she again attempted to not show that it was confusing her and assumed she had been asked what sport she was doing at the academy. "Power-kiting." Tessa spoke, lazily.
The dark haired female intrigued her slightly, there was a slight aura of sarcasm around her and Tessa wondered if there would ever be the possibility of her and the other being friends. Or prehaps not, Tessa usually kept herself to herself and hardly ever socialised with people she didn't know all that well. Especially one that spoke like Jamie. Hmm. The brunette looked up at the other as she moved her position. I wish I could eat breakfast. Shaking her head, the brunette leaned a little more into the wall and bit into her apple, again. "What are you on some kind of diet?" she asked casually; trying not to make it sound as though she was being sarcastic. "Maybe that would be a good idea for you." Tessa shrugged light-heartedly and chewed the new piece of apple. Jamie wasn't a fat person, in fact she was probably a lot skinnier than herself.
"Wow, you okay there, pal?"
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Post by jamie manlow on Jul 17, 2009 22:11:59 GMT
Jamie noticed by the nice, fat, long silence that Tess hadn't understood her and it only made her smirk. Jamie enjoyed talking obnoxiously fast so people couldn't understand her at all, especially those who didn't seem to be all that nice. Sighing, she looked up at Tessa when she answered Jamie's question. "Power-kiting?" she asked slowly, making sure Tessa would understand her. "What's that? I've heard of power surfing....is it closely related?" Watching her speech was something Jamie had learned to master so she didn't completely confuse people when she wanted to and now that something peaked her interest she was going to be careful with speaking. Tessa asked about the diet and Jamie could only laugh a little. "More like starvation." She cracked her fingers in her braces, flexing them a bit.
"In order for me to keep my body fat below 5%, I have to train all day long and eat only fruits, veggies and other nutritious stuff. I sneak in junk food but I can't do it a lot," she glanced over at Tessa, shrugging a bit. She got herself onto the high bar, surprised when Tessa asked if she was ok. "Yeah...I'm fine, why?" she frowned a bit then realized what must have made Tessa think something was wrong. She smiled with a light chuckle. "This is normal. One of the drills we used to do back home in Ireland was hang there to help develop endurance. I do it when I'm deciding what to do on the bars." Jamie finally lifted her body up onto the bars and leaned her pelvis against the top bar before rolling herself around it. Her momentum built enough and she let go of the bar to the lower bar, holding the hand stand for a second before swinging around the bar again.
The next transition was a flip to the top bar, her hands just barely grabbing hold of the bar but she did manage to make it. Doing a turn and then swinging around the bar three times, she did her dismount. A simple backflip was all she did and landed right, looking up at Tessa. "Sorry, I never introduced myself. I'm Jamie Manlow from Ireland." She said politely, smiling a bit while stripping her wrists of the braces. This time she tossed them with her stuff and got a sip of water. Some of the other girls would begin to arrive in the next few minutes or so, for the mean time Jamie would take solace in the quiet of the gym. Once all the girls were here, young and older, it was a bit chaotic. There were five balance beams, the floor mat, three vaults, two uneven bars and then the extra mats for the younger girls to practice on. For now though, the gym was perfect.
Sighing and heading to the balance beam, Jamie pulled herself onto it to just sit there. She tended to just sit on the balance beam to wake up or to take a break, liking it for some reason. Her green eyes wandered the gym before looking back up to Tessa who still stood a ways away. Scratching her arm idly, Jamie asked lightly, "Have you ever done gymnastics?"
(sorry it's short)
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Post by - - tessa phoenix ,, on Jul 18, 2009 19:33:40 GMT
It appeared apparent that the darker haired female was just being plain obnoxious and was taking great pleasure in the fact that Tessa was non-understanding of her talking, especially when she was doing so, as fast as she was. This was annoying the brunette to no end and she suddenly wished that she had not decided to come over to the gymnasium anytime soon. However, it was her turn to take the greatest pleasure in the fact that Jamie had to speak a little more slower for her to understand. She nodded to the questioned response and rubbed her nose a little too fiercly with slender, worked fingers. "Somewhat, only difference really is that power-kiting is done on land, whereas power-surfing is on water." Tessa finished off the rest of her apple and worked her long, slender legs over to the trash can in the corner of the gymnasium, tossing it in there.
The brunette raised her eyebrown when Jamie commented that it was more like starvation and kept her mouth shut. She knew that if she were to open her mouth, then quite possibly the wrong thing would come out and she would land herself in heaps of trouble, or more. Instead she just stood there, messing around with the bottle of water in her hands as she listened to Jamie talk about her diet. Something that she understood enough of. Afterall; she had done a bit of gymnastics when she was younger. "Sounds uninteresting if I'm honest with you." The younger girl fought back the urge to yawn sarcastically. "I'd actually rather eat the junk food and forget about keeping my body fat below five per cent, no-one can tell you what to eat; it is your body afterall." This was her arguement for the meantime, whilst she thought of something better to say.
"Eh." Tessa tilted her head slightly to the side and looked back over at Jamie. She was on the move again; it was hard for Tessa to watch her because she moved around so much and the brunette was beginning to feel slightly sea sick with going back and forth. Felt rather like a tennis match to be honest. Apparently asking Jamie if anything was wrong was the.. ahem, wrong thing to do and Tessa ended up slightly more confused than she had been earlier. However, everything was clarified for her and Tessa simply nodded. She watched Jamie flip around the bars and wondered how hard it could be to try that, but took a step backwards when she saw the flip to the top bar from the lower bar.
Jamie introduced herself as Jamie Manlow from Ireland and Tessa nodded, flipping the lid from her water bottle to take a long drink from it. "Tessa Phoenix, Quebec, Canada." The younger girl offered back, looking around the gym at all the equipment. Her mind wandered over to her past; the part where she had been all too willing to forget everything that had happened to her and the parts where gymnastics had been a big part of her life. Reminising was something she normally did whenever she felt agitated and annoyed with herself. However, Jamie's voice pulled her out of the rut and she shook her head to clear her thoughts, looking to the dark haired girl. "Years ago, before I came here." She spoke carefully, treading lightly across the floor to the balance beam and lifting herself up on to it with very little effort. Tessa dropped her water bottle to the floor and stood up, balancing carefully on the beam, walking across it with her arms outstretched flimsily.
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Post by jamie manlow on Jul 18, 2009 23:11:33 GMT
In all truth Jamie was a ball of energy and it took a lot to exhaust her. She hated sitting still so gymnastics made it easy for her to rid herself of most of that energy. Tessa explained power-kiting and Jamie found it a little dumb, but after thinking about it she realized how hard it must be. "It may be my body but if I want to win competitions and be considered one of the best in the world, I can't have any body fat," Jamie shrugged a bit at her side of the story. It was true, in order to be as good as she was and to place at the top of her level she had to be in the best shape possible. That meant little to no body fat and a lot of training time in the gym. Once she was atop one of the balance beams she stretched some and stood up.
Tessa answered her question which surprised Jamie, not expecting the girl to have known what gymnastics was like. Even if she had been young she would understand at least some of it but those who hadn't made it past Level four didn't really understand the true strain that was put on gymnasts to train and eat properly. Her green eyes immediately watched her walk along the four inch wide piece of wood before she lined herself up for a simple walk over. It would stretch her back out some more so when she really got into the routine of flips and turns that could cause some serious injury. Leaning back into the 'bridge' as it was called and let herself sit there for a second before pushing her legs over. The stretching in her muscles felt good and her back cracked a few times the next walk over she did.
"Sometimes I wish I had chosen horseback riding over gymnastics....actually I had no choice," she said with a sigh, remembering how her mother had decided she was going to be a gymnast. Being a gymnast meant her mother could get rid of her easily without having to deal with Jamie's raising. "At least you got to choose power-kiting." Glancing at Tessa, Jamie started into a light tumble of three back flips and caught her balance in the landing. She had a slight balance check but it was just barely noticeable. Lifting her leg into a straight line and pointed her toes, Jamie did a 540 degree turn so she faced the other way. Setting back down onto her feet she put the ball of her foot against the back edge of the beam before going into a hard tumble. She landed off balance and had to hop off the balance beam with a sigh, immediately hopping back up so she could try the tumble again. "Glad my coach isn't here to see that," she laughed. "He would have yelled at me."
((Sorry it's short. I'm tired))
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