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Lillie Buttery Gymnast Extraordinaire

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Lillie

Elizabeth Michael Associates, your agile partners

EMA prides itself on its community involvement, the focus of which is education. Our work culture is about supporting people to be successful and we are keen to help young people in our community shine so that they have the opportunity to be the best they can. We were recently introduced to Lillie, a young gymnast who is amongst the most promising of her age group in the UK. We were impressed not only with her talent, but with her determination to do well and the support and encouragement given to her by her family.

Lillie’s Mum and Dad are both health professionals with the NHS. They do find it difficult to balance their work lives with the demands of Lillie’s training. They describe this as a “source of constant strain.” So we have found a way to help them in the forthcoming 12 months.

If you want to see how Lillie is getting on check out this link occasionally as her monthly diary will be posted on this site regularly.

Lillie’s EMA diary

Posted September 2008

I said in my last diary that I was off to France for some training. While I was there I did things such as: Training in the gym with one of my coaches - Nick – I would have had my usual coach Jody but she was on holiday so we had Nick instead. While we were there we did a lot of swimming, training, playing and… you guessed it a girl’s hobby – shopping!!!

Me and my family recently come back off holiday from Cyprus to go see my Auntie and cousin (From my mum’s side of the family). While I was there I trained at a gym with an experienced Cypriot coach which was great. Cor, here’s me on holiday getting up at quarter past six for an hour or so in the gym (doing stretches and stuff not gymnastics, but instead of going out of condition I got fitter – my time for 400m went down to under 3 mins. Our grandma (or ‘Yia Yia’ if you want to speak Greek) came back with us for two weeks and then is going back to Cyprus for a week then back to South Africa. She lives in Cape Town.

Straight after my holiday I went to Lilleshall for 3 days for another squad training camp. This time our usual coach Jody could come with us. Even though this one wasn’t as long we still had to work twice as hard as we usually do in normal training. I didn’t have to do to much complex training because I had just come back off holiday.

During the Olympics I got up early to watch the gymnastics. I am sorry the British girls didn’t get a medal but our Becky Downie came 12th in the individuals which is great – the highest ever position for GB! We had a welcome home party for Becky last week, it was great fun – even if we weren’t allowed any unhealthy food like cake! In the men’s competition GB won their first Olympic gym medal in 80 years. Fantastic!

We have been sent the Milano Catalogue with me in it as Miss Milano this is my favourite picture from the catalogue. (Milano are the leading provider of leotards and gymnastics apparel-Ed)

On Saturday the 13th I travelled with my parents to Melksham for the British Alpha Factor Competition. That was the day before my competition but we still went down to watch my friends at level 3: they all did really well Anya she came 6th which was really great, and Saran was doing really well until she had a few falls on beam which let her down a bit and she came 11th, Hannah scored lowest as she only competed on the bars because she hurt her knee and can’t do any impact on it.

Then on Sunday it was our competition I was a bit nervous but it isn’t really a very important competition so it didn’t really matter where you came. We started off on floor and I went through perfectly. Secondly we were on vault and I landed that just inside the line (the limit of where you are allowed to stand).

Next we were on bars and I went through that clean but it was a bit shakey!!! Now we were on the dreaded plank (the beam)! I stuck on the beam as well so that means I went clean and I was the only gymnast out of my team who went through clean!!! With that result I came overall 7th out of 44 gymnasts and I came joint second on beam with a welsh girl called Raer Thecker. Kirsty came fifth overall and first on vault. Chenay however it wasn’t her best day and she came 16th. My coach is really pleased because my last competition was a disaster and it was very hard for me to go into another competition, but I coped with a British competition just fine.

The school year has started and I am working hard at my new school: Rushcliffe School, this is the best school for me as it is a good school and the gym is here too.

The Photo shows the winners lined up at Alpha Factor, I’m far left, the Notts girls have the same leotard, Chenay is next but one, Kirsty is near the other end.

Posted June 2008

This has been a good time. A few days ago I had a great day in the gym. I achieved these things: the first thing is a I did a bar routine over hard which means no mats under or anything; I also did a “flick layout” on the beam with no pad on the beam or mat under. A “flick layout” is when you firstly do a normal flick but then immediately after you do one again but with no hands.

Then just the other day I managed to do a “full blind” on the bar, this is a scary move where you “cast up” to handstand on the highest bar, swing round the bar three quarters of the way and then you would take off one hand, swing it round then put it back on, then take off the other hand then put it back on whilst turning the whole of your body to make it the right way to go into your dismount from the bar.

Right now I have had some different fun, I have been given permission to take part in a dance group at my school, even though it means missing some gym sessions. I am glad to be able to do this because I like dancing and I can be with some of my school friends. We are doing a show with some of the other local schools.

On the first night of the show my parents and big sister came to watch.

Today is Sunday and I am home from the County Championships, which I won at my level last year. This year I got a bronze medal, it wasn’t my best day, I fell off the bars and the beam, but I got a medal. One way, this wasn’t that good as only three of us competed, so I could feel sad about coming behind my friends Kirsty and Cheney, but the other way is that there are no other girls in the county to go against us.

My Mum and Dad have just heard that I have been invited as part of the British team for a training camp in France. This is a great opportunity and privilege, but also asks a lot of the family. We will need to buy a full set of British training kit. The support I am lucky to receive from Elizabeth Michael Associates will help fund the kit.

Posted April 2008
I ended my February diary saying ‘my next competition is the Level Two compulsory at Liverpool in March, I look forward to bringing you my latest news around that time.’ Sadly the competition went very badly for me and I did not pass, I will do it again soon. It was a very difficult experience for me and my Dad says I showed how tough I was to keep on going although I had one disaster after another!

I went to Newcastle a few weeks ago to compete but sadly I had hurt my foot in training so I could not compete, I was allowed to go down with the team as a reserve though.

Recently I had some good news, we found out a few weeks ago that I am now Miss Milano which means I will be in the Milano catalogue modelling for the leotards (Milano is a top leotard manufacturer) I will also get a trophy (which you don’t get to keep) a medal and £200 Milano vouchers for leotards but my mum says I’m allowed 3 leotards because they’re “3 for the price of 2,” and the rest of it is for lycra fabrics (which Milano sell) so mum can make me lots of leotards out of them.

Just before I went to France I went to the Gym on Sunday – my day off! And spent the day as a “runner” – carrying the judge’s scores to the scorers for a big Club Level Competition, my Dad helped collect the entrance money and we both stayed and helped clear up after the competition had finished.

I have just come back from a trip to France with couple of coaches and a few of my gymnastics friends. We went there to go watch the euro gymnastics I saw lots of great gymnasts who I have seen on the TV before and have been dying to see them live. One of the gymnasts representing Great Britain (Beth Tweddle) is the number one on bars and she admitted last week that she was the first ever gymnast to do a certain move on the bar so now it is called a ‘Tweddle’. With this amazing move in her bar routine everyone thought she would come first but sadly someone from another country beat her and she ended up 4th and no one in the arena was happy even other country’s supporters! But after that mistake she catched up with an amazing floor routine and came second on that piece.

Posted February 2008

Following my sixth place in the Level 3 compulsory competition at Guildford in November, I was invited to attend the British Gymnastics weekend training camp at Loughborough University. Four Notts girls went, we stayed at a nearby hotel, we shared a room but at least we had a bed each! We were four of 20 girls who were the top ten 9 & 10 year old gymnasts in GB.
Sadly one of the Welsh girls hurt her neck and went home, but a reserve soon arrived to take her place. One interesting piece of kit was a camera set up so that you could watch your performance, using this I remember seeing how my back leg was bent performing a ‘change-leg leap’ during my beam routine.

Since that camp I have added a new skill to my bar repertoire – a ‘forward giant’ and a ‘swing half to forward giant.’ A ‘giant’ is spinning around the high bar, a ‘forward giant’ is scary because you have to hang on with your hands curled around the bar from beneath not on top.

In April I will get the chance to accompany and support the British girls in an International Event near Paris, my coach is very keen for me to go to experience the atmosphere and challenges of this class of event. We expect there will be four girls from Notts Gym Club competing, however, in accordance with the rules of the Federation of International Gymnastics (FIG) it will be four years before I can compete at this level. This is an expensive trip and we are very grateful for the support from Elizabeth Michael & Associates which really makes a difference.

My next competition is the Level Two compulsory at Liverpool in March, I look forward to bringing you my latest news around that time.

Lillie with her bouquet at Guildford National Finals 07 (6th place)