October 19, 2008

Spotlight: Sanne Wevers

This weekend's Glasgow Grand Prix wasn't particularly well attended on the women's side. One of the relatively unknown gymnasts who managed to stand out in a positive way was Holland's Sanne Wevers, who won both the UB and BB finals. Wevers also qualified for the floor final, but a fall on her double pike opening pass and a step out of bounds on another pass prevented her from medaling.

Photobucket
Photo from Wevers' website

Sanne Wevers was born on September 17, 1991, and is coached by her father, Vincent. She also has a twin sister who is a very good gymnast, Lieke. At the 2008 Dutch national championships, Sanne placed second all-around behind Suzanne Harmes, while Lieke ranked third. Both sisters train at Bosan TON in Almelo, a club which has recently produced a string of quality gymnasts. Two members of Holland's bronze-medal-winning team at the 2008 Junior Europeans, Wyomi Masela and Yvette Moshage, hail from Bosan TON, as does Wyomi's elder sister Tahnee, who has been a member of the Dutch senior squad for some time now. Clearly the club is going to be a dominant force on the Dutch scene for the next few years.

Photobucket
Vincent Wevers: Holland's next super coach?

Sanne Wevers is best known for her beam routine, which features two double turns, one regular, the other with the left leg raised horizontally. Thanks to her beautiful beam routine (which currently has a 6.4 start value), Wevers made the beam final at the 2008 Cottbus, Tianjin and Maribor Grand Prix events before finally taking the gold in Glasgow. We have a feeling we'll be seeing a bit more of her in beam finals from now on.

Click here to view Wevers' gold-medal-winning performance at the Glasgow Grand Prix, including her two trademark double turns!
Posted by at
Labels: , ,

2 comments:

  1. AnonymousOctober 30, 2008 at 6:34 PM

    I love that double turn with the leg at horizontal! So pretty. And to do another double turn in the same routine definitely shows great mastery.

    It would be nice to see the Dutch regain the kind of form they had a few years ago. Are Suzanne Harmes and Verona van de Leur still competing?

    Siobhan

    ReplyDelete
  2. The Gym GirlsOctober 31, 2008 at 12:44 AM

    As far as we know, Suzanne Harmes is still going strong, despite motherhood and all that. She competed in the Olympics (where she failed to qualify for any finals) and we haven't heard any retirement rumors yet. Verona van de Leur retired just after the 2008 Europeans, following a period of intense intrigue in the Dutch gymnastics community which involved, among other things, her coach being temporarily banned from coaching. When she realized she wasn't going to qualify for the Olympics (Suzanne Harmes secured Holland's lone berth), she quit, without even bothering to show up at nationals. Holland's new crop of gymnasts looks promising though. Their juniors just missed out on the silver in the team competition at the Europeans!

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)