Road to Rio

Chapter 9: Leotards and Training

***The picture above is supposed to be the team Olympic leotard***
Bailie's POV
Today Ragan got her leotard for the Olympics. "Picking the team leotard this year was the hardest thing I've ever done!" Ragan said over exaggerating. "Why?" I asked her. "Because there were tons of them to choose from! There weren't many white ones but there were a ton of red and blue ones!" She said plopping onto the bed and letting out a huge sigh. "Well where is your leotard?" I asked Ragan. "Oh yeah it's over here!" She said pulling it out of a bag. "Dang that's pretty! No wonder it took you forever babe!" I told her and kissed her cheek. "Well it takes you forever just to get out of bed!" She said laughing. "Well I am crippled so that's why it takes me forever." I told her. "Well it's only 1 week until you hopefully get off them!" Ragan exclaimed. "Yeah hopefully! I hate these things! Why did I have to tear my ACL!" I said and let out a huge sigh. Ragan started laughing. "I did the same thing when I was 19 and I felt the same way you feel. It sucked because I could only do bars and I couldn't do my dismount. I had to relearn almost every one of my elite skills and I had to do a watered-down vault for a while." Ragan said while putting her leotard up. "Hey I was just thinking-" I tried saying. "Uh oh! Bailie's thinking again!" Ragan said making us both laugh. "Well anyways," I continued, "Do you think coach will let me do bars?" I asked. "Probably but your on crutches so I'd just do the basics and you don't have a leotard or your grips!" Ragan pointed out. "Actually," I started saying, "I never leave home without leotards and grips." I said while getting a Texas Dreams leotard and my grips out of my suitcase. "Wow I thought I was a prepared person!" Ragan said. "Well I'm going to go get dressed and you should too!" Ragan said acting giddy. We started walking over to the training center. "Hey coach will you let me do bars today?" I asked her. "Well your on crutches and you can't do dismounts." She said. "But as long as I get the assistant coach to spot you and you're careful, you can train today!" She exclaimed. "Thanks so much!" I told her. "You're welcome!" She said. Emma walked over to me and gave me a huge hug. "I'm so glad that you're training again." She said. "Well I'll have to see how it goes today but hopefully it goes well." I said. "Good luck!" Emma said and Ragan did too while walking over to vault. "Thanks!" I told them both. I grab my grips and put them on. I put chalk on my ripped up gymnast hands. "Hey Bailie it's nice to see you training again!" Our assistant coach, Zane, told me. "Thanks!" I said. He helps me get on the high bar because I can't jump up to it. I start my routine. I haven't done my geinger in a while so I needed a spot for that. I caught the bar. I did a kip cast handstand into a stadler, into a tkachev, and then a pak salto. I did a chow back to the high bar. I then did a jaeger. I did three giants and then I did a kip. I couldn't do my twisting double layout dismount. "That was great but make sure on that pak that you keep your legs together." Coach Zane said. "I also want to mainly just work on your geinger today and working it into your routine." He continued saying. "Ok and don't let me fall. I don't want to rebreak my knee!" I said laughing. "Ok I won't. Now go get a drink you crazy kid." He said laughing. The girls just got finished on beam and are heading to bars. I went over to beam to work on my mount. I don't put any pressure on my legs to do it. After about an hour of working on beam and bars, practice ended and we went back to our hotel. Ragan and I decided to watch a movie later that night. We watched Finding Dory just because that's been our favorite movie since it came out. Ragan popped some popcorn and plopped onto the bed with me. We soon fell asleep.