THERE was silver medal joy for Pinewood Gymnastics Club duo Lucie Colebeck and Yasmin Taite at the Trampoline and Tumbling Senior World Championships in Denmark.
The duo were part of the Great Britain squad which flew out to Scandinavia for the annual competition and returned having secured a podium finish in the team event.
Colebeck also overcame a mental block to take second place in the individual section, where she finished behind winner and two-time world champion Jia Fangfang of China.
The Pinewood pair are no strangers to the championships, having racked up five appearances between them over the years.
The duo would perform two preliminary runs consisting of a straight pass and a twisting pass, with the performances resulting in Team GB qualifying for the team final in first place, leading both China and Russia, who progressed in second and third respectively.
This also doubled up as qualification for the individual final too, where Coleback secured third place, with Taite back in sixth.
Because of the two-per-country rule, however, Colebeck was unable to compete in the final.
Back in the team event, the pressure was on all the finalists as each participant had just the one run.
Yasmin, though, would feel it more as she was carrying an injury, yet she battled through the pain barrier to produce a double straight transition to a double pike somersault, which yielded a score of 33.1 for her efforts.
Up next was Lucie, whose impressive double straight transition to a full twisting double pike somersault was a hit with the judges, who scored it 34.7.
Rachel Davies of the Deerness Valley Club completed the routine, keeping her focus to secure a return of 35.2 and the silver medal for GB, who finished an agonising 0.5 points behind eventual winners China.
Davies and Colebeck would represent their country in the individual final, where both had two routines to compete.
Any skill was acceptable, provided the discipline was not repeated.
In order to succeed, Coleback would need to address the struggle with a twisting element which had been troubling the ace during the months leading up to the competition.
Starting the final in sixth, a slight error did not help proceedings, either, but Lucie soon rectified the issue and would receive an opening score of 33.7.
There was still work to be done, but a nervous Colebeck stuck at it, producing a second run which consisted of a double straight transition through to a doubling twisting double tuck.
And the scoring panel was impressed, rewarding the tumbler with a score of 35.4, which saw Lucie jump up the leaderboard and into second position.
“After I had made that mistake in the first routine I knew I had to complete the move I hadn’t been able to in order to get on the podium,” Colebeck admitted afterwards.
“It was so overwhelming. I knew in my head that if I committed to going for the move I would land on my feet.
“It was a huge relief and was extremely emotional.”
Colebeck and Taite are now in training ahead of the European Championships, which takes place in Spain in March.
