After almost two weeks of competition, the 30th Southeast Asian (SEA) Games came to an end on Wednesday 11th December 2019 and we take a step back to reflect on the competition.

Before we go into medals, performances and future plans, from us all at Singapore Gymnastics we want to thank everyone who has helped us on this journey towards SEA Games. From the parents who are our biggest cheerleaders, to the Sports Science Sports Medicine (SSSM) team, Singapore Sports Institute (SSI), National Youth Sports Institute (NYSI) and the SG coaching team, we thank you! To all our competing athletes, for your dedication, determination and effort put in to get to where you are, we are incredibly proud and we salute you. 

To Sean, Congratulations! We could not be more happy for his achievement as he has really worked hard for this occasion. It was in 2017 when he went in as a medal potential that he was injured at the Games before competing. Sean then took time out to reflect and assess what he wanted to do. He returned to training with this one goal in mind. The medal is a credit to Sean’s tenacity, and the continued support of his amazing family, the entire MAG squad and credits to our coaching team. Terry and Lincoln also got into finals, with Lincoln giving the crowd an exciting High Bar routine as well as his personal best. While we were meant to have 5 MAG gymnasts competiting, we unfortunately had to reduce the team and have one of the 5 MAG athletes as a non competing travelling reserve when the Games organisers suddenly reduced the number of MAG to compete from 5 to 4.

In all, Singapore had 10 athletes travelling to Manila, even though 13 athletes were selected. 3 of the WAG athletes sustained injuries, 2 of them being podium favourites Nadine and Sze En just weeks before departure. It was also only 2 weeks before the competition that the organisers added the WAG individual all around medal due to pressure from the international gymnastics federation and gender equality. Decisions had already been made on the fact that the WAG athletes would only perform on their pet events. We did a brief comparison over the last 2 SEA Games on the breakdown on medal categories and how the inclusion or exclusion of any category across disciplines can make a difference in overall results. It is important to note that all five medals won in 2017 were not on offer in 2019 SEA Games!

Given all these curveballs, Shayne went into the Games as sole WAG representative to come in 2nd in the qualifying rounds for Balance Beam. While she did not podium in the finals, this has been Shayne’s first major competition debuted, and we will be counting on her to lead a team of younger athletes such as Emma Yap and Mia Tay into the next SEA Games 2021. 

Other exciting young athletes that will be eligible for 2021 SEA Games are rhythmic gymnasts Angeline Lin Qihong and Ho Jin Wen Sophia. Leading the way were Leah and Avryl who made it though to the finals for 3 apparatus and being Avryl’s first time at SEA Games focusing on just the individual events. The girls performed their best and had been well prepared by coach Irina Bessmertnaya. Unlike SEA Games 2017, there was no team or individual all around event this year.

We know we need to continue building our high performance culture and focus on the development of our coaches and athletes while working with SportSG to gain an increase in Sport Science and Sport Medicine support. In high performance we needed to identify the athlete pathway in gymnastics for all our disciplines and the support required at each step. Hence we have a 6-8 year plan in place to grow a true athlete centric high performance programme for gymnastics where our athletes are stronger and more mentally resilient.

In 2017 Singapore Gymnastics  developed an ambitious Strategic Plan around best practise governance, growth and connection to the membership/community as well as the adoption of a holistic high performance plan focusing on adopting a true high performance culture supported by the necessary Sport Science, Sports Medicine (SSSM). In 2018 we adopted a new Constitution that will pave the way for gymnastics and build the membership base required to ensure the organisation's financial viability.

Over the past 2 years we have looked at how we can build the capacity and capability of the clubs and coaches in the community. It’s a long term plan supported by SportSG. We have brought in experts to upskill our community, developed a robust and integrated coach education framework that will underpin the development of home grown coaches.

We've appointed a much-needed WAG head coach Gerritt Beltman who started in August this year, while at the same time have recruited and will continue to recruit and attract high caliber coaches for all our disciplines. Still a little way to go but by the end of 2020 we have confidence that we will have a coaching team across all disciplines which will build a sustainable framework and structure.

Apart from the technical skills preparation, other areas of improvement we want to target include having an imbedded SSSM network into our programmes full time to ensure that our athletes are consistently conditioned to be fitter, stronger and not just in a short lead-in time to major games. This will increase and maximise the athletes' time in the gym and more importantly reduce injuries. The affordance of training grounds also plays a big factor in performance productivity and it is something we are also working closely with SportSG to overcome our current venue restraints. It could also encourage more training exchange opportunities for all our disciplines with other countries which would really continue to raise the bar of our athletes and increase their competitiveness.

Another major focus would be how to strike a balance between school and high performance training for our athletes. It takes 6 years for Women's Artistic and Rhythmic gymnasts, 8 years for Men's Artisitic gymnasts to see any true results of the hard work that we have put in place. That said, with Sze En qualifying for the Tokyo Olympics, it is a true motivator and hopefully inspires the current and next generation to believe and aim for the highest level of our sport.

It takes a village to raise champions, future Olympic hopeful athletes and we will continue rallying the troops to get us there.