Double silver for Lukisha
Lukisha clinched two silver medals including the team medal and a silver medal after a brilliant performance.
ALBERTON – Lukisha Schalk, 13-year-old SA junior women’s artistic gymnast who resides in Alberton, was part of a five-member team for juniors that participated in the 12th African Gymnastics Championships in artistic and rhythmic gymnastics at the University of Pretoria Indoor Sports Centre.
Lukisha and her team narrowly missed the team gold and were crowned silver medallists overall. She clinched two silver medals including the team medal and a silver medal in the floor individual finals after a brilliant performance.
The competition program of women’s artistic gymnastics includes the vault table, the uneven bars, the beam and the floor. This competition is held every two years with 13 African countries competing, made up of about 200 gymnasts and about 100 officials, coaches and judges combined.
Countries participated in this year’s competition were Algeria, Angola, Benin, Botswana, Cape Verde, Egypt, Lesotho, Morocco, Namibia, the Republic of Congo, Tunisia, Zimbabwe and the host country, South Africa. The gymnasts met all the requirements to qualify under the rules and regulations of the International Gymnastics Federation, the governing body for gymnastics worldwide.
Lukisha is a steadfast and focussed gymnast that has been involved in competitive women artistic gymnastics and tumbling at the tender age of six years old by being awarded her Eastern Gauteng colours in 2007, to being promoted to SA Junior Olympic status in 2013, with advancement to become a SA senior Olympic gymnast in 2015. Lukisha is a member of the prestigious Johannesburg Gymnastics Centre (JGC), an affiliation of SAGF (South African Gymnastics Federation) and registered with SASCOC. She is an elite High Performance (HP) development gymnast. Her academic achievements are consistently above average (+75 per cent), making her also an academic merit achiever.
Lukisha is currently preparing to compete in the USAIGC Championship in the USA in June and is grateful for the financial assistance received from the Ulwazi Group.
