OCR Text |
Show U.S. Sports Acrobatics national meet in Centrum this week T he United States national team in sports acrobatics, which will represent the country in international meets during the next year, will be selected here July 26-30 in competition at the Centrum. "About 400 athletes, including 3 1 teams from across the country are expected to compete in the meet's four competitive levels," Dave Leite, meet director and and chairman of the organizing committee, said. "Each athlete must have qualified through two local, one state, and one regional meet; so we will be seeing some very good performances." Opening ceremonies for the meet are scheduled July 26 at 7 p.m. in the Centrum. Actual competition will start July 27-30. Sessions, featuring competition in the intermediate and advanced levels, will start at 9 a.m. each day. The evening session schedule starts at 7 p.m. each night and will include competition in the elite and junior elite divisions . "About the only difference between elite and junior elite is age," Leite explains. "Junior elite athletes m ust be between 11 and 18 years old. Elite athletes must be at least 12 years old, and there is no maximum age. Both levels run itentical competitive programs which include five routines, with two performances of a balance routine, two performances of a tempo (or 'flight') routine and a combined routine. "Actually some of the entrants in the advanced level throw some stuff as good as the elite level people; they are just restricted to the advanced level because of their age." Elite national champions are selected on the basis of their scores from three of the five routines, and the world competition team is selected from the scores from all five routines. "Usually the two teams consist of the same athletes; but to compete in world competition, an athlete m ust be at least 14 years old," Leite said. Competition will be in seven events: women's pair, mixed pair, men's pair, women's trio, men's four, male platform tumbling, and female platform tumbling. In the elite level 17-20 pairs or groups are expected to compete, and about six men and women entrants are expected in each of the tumbling events"Sports acrobatics has been accepted by the Olympic Committee as an (CONTINUED ON PAGE 7) Eleven-year-old Jennifer Huffman, top, gets some support from teammate Natasha Stojkovic, 16, during warmups in the Centrum Monday. The gymnasts are members of the Power Club Express team of St. Louis, Mo., one of 31 teams at SUU this week for the sports acrobatics national championships. |