Mixing it with the best

Marriotts Gym Club mixed with the big boys over the weekend.

The Goresbrook Leisure Centre in London hosted a record-breaking weekend of men's artistic gymnastics.

An impressive and record line-up of more than 120 gymnasts were in the London men's open, and more than 250 entered the London development open.

Britain's best male gymnasts competed alongside the top rising stars in the two-day competition.

Marriotts' star performer was Daniel Gardner who took gold in the intermediate one 'in age' competition on Sunday.

Daniel, who will be 14 this month, took the title with a fine score of 54.50. He not only won his age group, but also scored better than all of the older 'out of age' gymnasts who were competing at the same level.

A number of other Marriotts boys also took part at various levels, some in their first big competition. They were Ben Drew, Alex Carrier, Zoli Andrews, Nathan Tella, Ross Bell, Frankie Hillier, David Fraser, Tom Clements, Cameron Currie, Noah Hume and Kieran McGowan.

Although not in the medals, the boys all put in good performances, although Kieran had to pull out with an injury part of the way through the competition.

There was further Stevenage interest in the men's senior competition on Saturday as Ivan Bulyha took his first steps into the senior level of competition.

The 17 year old, who trains at the Hinckley Gym Club, and whose parents are head coaches at Marriotts, was up against the top senior male gymnasts in the country.

Ivan put in some controlled performances to take an excellent 19th place from a field of 46 gymnasts.

His mother, Svetlana, was not able to watch her son compete as she was busy with gymnasts from the Marriotts girls' squad who were competing in the regional final of the 'compulsory grades' at Ipswich.

And Hannah Rayfield and Lucy Moxham took gold and silver in the 'out of age' compulsory four grade to round off an excellent weekend for the club.