The 28-year-old Halifax native now has a gymnastics skill named after her added to the sport’s points code after she performed it in 2022
Ellie Black competes in the uneven bars in the Women's Artistic Gymnastics competition of the 2024 Canadian Gymnastics Championships, in Gatineau, Que., on Friday, June 7, 2024.The 28-year-old from Halifax will become the first Canadian to compete in artistic gymnastics in four Olympic Games when women’s qualification starts Sunday in Paris.
A gymnast who performs an element that no one has ever done in high-level competition becomes eponymous with that skill. The average age of all Canadian women who have competed in Olympic artistic gymnastics is just over 17. Black was already the oldest to do so at age 25 in Tokyo in 2021. “Just because no one else has done it or it’s not very common for athletes to stay in their sport into their late twenties or thirties, why can’t you do that? Why can’t you do that and be successful and still be getting better?”
Black benefited from training at her hometown Alta Gymnastics club, where there were no other elite women for her to compare herself to, or be compared to. “The hours are quite a bit less, the repetitions are quite a bit less, and there’s more time for recovery and more space for trust in her program and just knowing that she knows what to do and she’ll be able to do it when the time comes.”
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