“Condobolin is a small and remote town and we don’t have a lot of access to different styles of dance or sport. The only dance in town is at my Physie classes.  There’s no gymnastics, just swimming, netball, cricket or football.

So these school holidays I arranged for a friend of mine, Irina, to come up from Melbourne to teach gymnastic as part of our Physie holiday workshop, to increase our members’ strength and flexibility and help them be better at Physie. Irina is originally from Russia and grew up in a circus as a performer. She is trained in acrobatics, trapezes, tight rope, juggling and much more.

We started with a whole day of physie on the first day, focusing on syllabus and technique. Then we progressed to 3 days of gymnastics.

All groups were small, with between 6 and 12 participants so we could focus on each member, progressing at their own pace. We worked on flexibility, core strength, balance, kicking, jump splits and more difficult tricks, depending on the girls’ ability.

All the girls had the most amazing time, even with the tears and frustrations that come with learning so many new and challenging moves. It’s great to get out of your comfort zone and we all enjoyed the challenge of trying something new!”

Louise