Cate Shearwater - Somersaults and Dreams - Going for Gold

The coach did not smile back. ‘Did I tell you to chuck a double, Trengilly?’

‘I . . . I just thought . . .’ Ellie stammered, trying to ignore the throbbing pain in her ankle. ‘I had the speed so I . . . I thought I’d try for the double twist.’

‘Yeah, well, your take-off isn’t high enough yet,’ said Vivian, ‘and you’re not aggressive enough in your push to land a double safely.’

‘But I thought that . . .’

‘You’re also pulling your shoulder back too early,’ Vivian went on, her face unyielding. ‘You shouldn’t allow your feet to go over your hands till your body is starting to bend . . .’

‘Right, I . . .’

‘ Right .’ Vivian glared at her. ‘So until you can get all that correct, I want you to stick to singles – nothing more than a one and half till I say so. Get it?’

Ellie was struggling with a mixture of emotions – disappointment, embarrassment, anger – and the horrible shooting pain in her ankle. She struggled to keep her voice even as she said, ‘But I thought we were working up new skills . . .’

Vivian stuck her hands on her hips and narrowed her eyes. ‘Trengilly, you wanna remember who the coach is here?’

Ellie bit her lip hard.

‘Come back to me when you’ve got a bit more muscle in those scrawny arms and then we’ll talk about upgrades!’

Ellie turned away, her eyes blurry with tears, her face burning with humiliation and her ankle throbbing. It had been just about the worst start to her week at National squad camp possible.

Luckily, the rest of the session went a bit better. Bar, beam and floor with the other coaches was hard work but Ellie found working on new skills exhilarating. She received as much encouragement as critique, even if her ankle did continue to bother her throughout the session. She was by far the strongest on bars – where not even Memory could match her difficulty value – and on floor and beam her artistry was scored as highly as her power tumbles and acro sequences.

The other coaches seemed keen to help her upgrade, and it was a relief to find that not everyone thought she was a completely hopeless gymnast. But Ellie knew that if she was to get a look-in for the Euros squad – or even get a call-back for the selection weekend in six weeks’ time – she was going to have to impress Vivian – or be left out in the cold.

CHAPTER

Three

‘Vivian’s totally got it in for me,’ Ellie told Tam when they sat down for supper that night. At the heart of the National Sports Training Centre was a beautiful old honey-coloured mansion, which housed the dining hall and the dorms where the gymnasts slept during their week at camp. Surrounding this were a collection of state-of-the-art sports facilities, medical centres, and physio and rehab units. Beyond them were formal gardens and then sports pitches and training grounds for every sport under the sun.

Athletes and sportspeople from every discipline came here to train ahead of international events, but right now the centre was pretty empty; the only people there were the gymnasts who would be training there intensively for the next seven days – eating, sleeping and breathing gymnastics!

The food in the canteen was delicious, although Ellie found she had lost her appetite.

‘Maybe it’s not you she’s annoyed at,’ suggested Tam, who had definitely not lost his. He was tucking into a giant bowl of sticky toffee pudding as if he hadn’t eaten for days.

Tam had detached himself from the other Junior boys to come and join the girls from the Academy, who were all sitting together. Even the Senior squad girls Sian Edwards and Sophia Mitford had come to keep the younger girls company. Tam was the only boy from the Academy who’d qualified for GB squad this year. Olympic medallist Matt Simmons was out with an injury and Tam’s Academy squad mate Robbie had performed poorly at the British so missed out on selection. But this didn’t seem to bother Tam. He’d been coming to squad camps since he was a kid – this was his fifth time here, so he knew lots of the boys from other clubs. Ellie was glad he made time to see them during mealtimes.

‘I feel like I’ve done something to annoy Vivian,’ she said. ‘But I have no idea what!’

‘That’s not hard to work out,’ Tam went on, wiping toffee sauce off his chin with a shrug. ‘Everyone knows she and Lizzie were deadly rivals.’

‘ Were they?’ said Ellie.

‘Ellie, sometimes I think you know nothing about gymnastic history at all!’ said Bella, shaking her head in disbelief.

‘You really don’t!’ Sian laughed. ‘It’s one of the most famous rivalries in gym history!’

‘Lizzie and Vivian were rivals?’ Ellie repeated. How did everyone else know this and not her?

‘Even I know this!’ said Katya, shaking her head as if reading her thoughts.

‘Oh,’ said Ellie. ‘Right.’

‘What do you actually know about Vivian Ponting?’ asked Sian gently. She might be an Olympic gold medallist, but kind Sian always had time for the younger gymnasts.

‘Not much,’ Ellie admitted.

‘OK, let’s start from the beginning,’ said Tam, grinning at Ellie. Things had been a bit weird between them earlier in the year. Robbie had teased Tam about being Ellie’s boyfriend and for a while they hadn’t really spoken. But now they were back to normal again, and Ellie was glad – she’d missed him and his sense of humour. ‘So, Vivian was known for her bubbly personality, OK?’

‘She was always chatting to the TV cameras mid-competition,’ agreed Kashvi. ‘High-fiving judges, disco dancing after a great score.’

‘Writing messages on her palm and holding them up on the podium,’ added Tam. ‘She was cool!’

Ellie tried to imagine it. Strict Vivian being funny and cool, and messing around? Wow!

‘But she was deadly serious as a competitor,’ said Sian. ‘Incredibly ambitious. She always said she wanted to get to the top, no matter what it took.’

‘There was only one thing standing in her way,’ said Kashvi. ‘And that was . . .’

‘Lizzie Trengilly!’ said Katya and Tam at exactly the same time.

‘I see,’ said Ellie. It was all starting to make sense now.

‘The reason Vivian Ponting has so many silver medals is because Lizzie beat her into second place in everything,’ explained Sian.

‘But she won Olympic gold,’ said Ellie.

‘The year Lizzie injured herself and had to pull out,’ Bella finished for her.

Ellie was silent for a moment, taking it all in. She’d spent hours, poring over pictures of Aunt Lizzie, but she’d never paid much attention to her competitors. But of course that’s why Vivian had looked familiar – she’d seen her dozens of times, standing on podiums next to Lizzie. Always on her left, the silver medal spot.

‘Vivian was a huge talent. In any other era she’d have been the greatest gymnast in the world,’ said Sian. ‘But because of Lizzie she was always the runner-up.’

Ellie glanced over to where Vivian was sitting with Barbara Steele and the boys’ coaches. She wondered how that had felt – always finding herself in second place. Never quite good enough to win the gold. Was she still mad about it? Was that why she disliked Ellie?

‘After Lizzie retired, Vivian kept competing for a bit, but she was never as good,’ said Sian, ruefully. ‘It was almost like . . . like she lost her edge when she stopped chasing Lizzie.’

‘I don’t think she ever won a major gold medal after that, did she?’ said Tam.