Kaitlyn Lyle has a very simple goal when she goes to big competitions: Have fun.
Lyle, an 8th grader from Charter School Morgan Hill, said she doesn’t aim to have a certain place or reach a certain level during the season, but rather she wants to have fun.
“If you’re not having fun doing it, you’re not going to get better,” Lyle said. “If you’re too down on yourself or too nervous, it’s not going to help you. I’d rather let loose and have fun with it.”
She took 14th overall at the Junior Olympics in Texas on May 14 and 15 with a score of 37.55 in her all around.
Lyle’s strongest event came in the bars where she scored a 9.475 followed by a 9.45 on the beam and a 9.425 on the floor routine. She rounded things out with a 9.2 on the vault.
Lyle said she really took in the experience competing against some strong competition.
“It was really cool to see my competition and people my age,” Lyle said. “I know I’ll be competing against them for scholarships too, so to see them and see what other skills they have so I can work on them too.”
First place finished with a 38.525, so Lyle was right there.
She advanced by being the No. 5 finisher at the Region 1 championships in Las Vegas where she posted a score of 37.525.
Lyle’s score didn’t waver too much, in fact was slightly better than her regional scores.
And that is not easy to do, Lyle said.
“In gymnastics it is really hard to be consistent,” Lyle said. “It depends on the day and it depends on how focused you are. And to get those few tenths back, you have to be focusing on every little detail possible.”
This was her second time competing at JOs and finished almost a full point better than she did a year ago. Lyle said she didn’t have the same nerves at this meet largely because college coaches weren’t as visible.
“The whole environment with all the people, I definitely learned from that,” Lyle said. “I wasn’t nervous because everyone was supper happy and high energy.”
She also has familiarity in traveling to Ft. Worth, Texas for competitions, also flying out there for national team training in the past.
Lyle said the difference was really in how many practices she had to take part in. When she traveled there in the past, there were a couple of practices per day, but in the competition, she got to relax in the evening.
Lyle has to have that high energy and positive attitude as she practices six days per week, leaving early from school to attend workouts in Santa Clara.
She went straight from the airport in Sunday, got some sleep and was back in school on Monday.
Luckily now the competition season is over, so workouts are going to drop to five days per week during the summer, but they’ll also go longer.
