Our love of gymnastics began when we were 5 and 7 years old.
We were fortunate enough to be coached by Mrs Pauline Prestidge who at the time was one of the best coaches at the best club in the country.
Right: Mrs P correcting mine and Nikki’s beam routine.
She coached a number of British Champions including Suzanne Dando also in the picture.
This picture attached shows us as part of Suzanne’s Team Winning The London Youth Games.
Our gymnastics career was intense and successful training 20 Hours plus a week, and achieving National Squad Status.
On retirement we wanted to give something back to the sport which had given us so much. So in 1989 Nikki and I started coaching a small number of gymnasts. Today we coach hundreds of gymnasts!!!
If you are interested please feel free to have a look at these books which Gina and Nikki are in.
Better Gymnastics by Pauline Prestidge
Skills & Tactics of Gymnastics by Peter Aykroyd
The quality of coaching was recognised by The London Gymnastics Federation at a Special Ceremony. The famous Olga Korbut Olympic Gymnast (Munich 1972) presented Gina with the the prestigious award of COACH OF THE YEAR and a few years later CLUB OF THE YEAR.
The coaches also keep their gymnastics up to date by doing displays and even taking part in competitions. See Montages
For example: Gina competed in the British Veterans and Won Silver in 30 – 40 Year Age Group.
As to the future
The club is always looking to maintain and improve our standards. Due to the exceptional demand we are looking at how we can timetable new classes
and develop boys gymnastics. We are welcoming some new coaches to the club as well as introducing some of our ex gymnasts – Some who have been at the club for 15 years – to coaching roles.
This is what we call our Charisma Circle of life where gymnasts who join us as 4 year olds progress through the club and then become coaches, they then have their own children who then attend the club.
The Charisma Circle of Life !
We want to explore the idea of display gymnastics which we did some years ago very successfully. Finally we are continuing our desire to offer young gymnasts as many opportunities as possible by continuing our trips overseas.
The futures bright, The future is (Charisma!)