Ellie Mallinger is a sophomore at north high, she has been in gymnastics for 11 years and absolutely loves the sport. “I decided to join high school gymnastics because I ended my club gymnastics career last March but I didn’t want to stop doing gymnastics because I love it.”

Ellie started gymnastics when she was four years old. She has won a lot of medals, over 150! She has also won countless ribbons, 10 plaques and many trophies.

When I asked Ellie if she wished she’d done another sport she said “I don’t wish that I did another sport, I’m grateful that I was put into gymnastics because even though it was very difficult, it taught me a lot of discipline and courage.

Conditioning and working out for gymnastics is very hard and intense. Ellie has had summer practices that were as long as 7 ½ hours long! And unlike other sports, gymnastics is non-stop.

During a gymnastics career you can do a lot of damage to your body. Ellie has broken eight bones and sprained one.

When Ellie was asked the question if she wanted to go to college and be on their gymnastics team, this was her answer, “Gymnastics is different from most other sports in the sense that club gymnastics is the higher level so usually gymnast coming from high school don’t do college gymnastics but it’s always possible so I’m not 100% sure.”