Year 12 student and Australia's leading Rhythmic Gymnast, Alexandra Kiroi-Bogatyreva was one step away from completing her extensive Olympic qualification to represent Australia at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo. She spent 2 months training in Europe in early 2020, competed in the Berlin Masters in Germany, bringing home a range of medals and was in peak form by March 2020. But the postponement of the Olympic Games to 2021 and cancellation of the last round of Olympic qualification due to the coronavirus pandemic created plenty of uncertainty for Alexandra , affecting every single aspect of her life. Her completion of her Year 12 studies over a 2 year period is now even more complicated since the exam time shift is heavily clashing with her further Olympic preparation.
In a recent newspaper interview , Alexandra commented: “Everything was ready,” she said. “I was physically ready. I was mentally ready." “Everything that’s happened now, hit me really hard … because I had one step for qualifying for Tokyo, and I was going in as number one athlete.” . Training out of the garage in a tiny space instead of the proper gymnastics training hall, with ceilings of 12 meters, not having proper access to her coaches and being out of competitions certainly disrupted her Olympics preparation. Besides dealing with all the issues that ordinary Year 12 students deal with, Alex had to make many adjustments to her training. Stopping training even for couple of days was not a question at all.
However - Alex who is certainly "made out of steel" is not to be derailed from her goal. Right now Alexandra is studying hard and trains up to 30 hours a week. On weekends she broadcasts live gymnastics masterclasses that are being watched all over the World, and assists in Masterclasses for the World's leading coaches and former World Champions acting as both demonstrator and translator. Alexandra got involved in an initiative called Kick-off with a star, where corporate businesses can invite a volunteer sport star to their weekly team meeting to boost the morale and provide motivation and inspiration to the team as a result of the pandemic. With limited time, Alexandra attended the Maccabi Victoria/Maccabi Australia Awards ceremony via Zoom where she was recognised as the Jewish Junior Sportswoman for 2019 in Victoria and in Australia. Alexandra is involved in several projects with Maccabi and has been invited to be a guest panellist at a "Sports & Wellbeing in Our Community" Seminar alongside experts in the field of science, medicine, and sport.
The message from Alexandra is simple: "Being busy keeps you going and not looking at the bad things happening around, look after your self physically and mentally and Keep Safe"
Alex is still on the road to Olympics 2020 - which will be taking place in Tokyo 2021. But unlike it was planned - she will not be a school student when the Games happen. She credits King David for assisting her on the road to the Olympics and being able to combine World class training and schooling.
MAY