WOLVERINES CLAIM FIRST TITLE

Gymnastics crown goes to Westview after a two-year wait

The long wait came to an end in championship fashion for the Westview High gymnastics team.

Led by all-around optional champion Camille Caires, the Wolverines claimed their first section championship Friday at the CIF Gymnastics Championships held at Mt. Carmel High School. Due to the pandemic, the county’s prep gymnasts were competing for CIF titles for the first time since the 2019 season.

“It was really difficult because we didn’t have a chance to practice through the COVID,” said Caires, a junior who took first place on the bars and vault and second on the floor and beam for a first-place all-around score of 36.775. “We all had to rebuild our skills.”

Caires credited her vault routine as the key to her winning performance.

“I was really solid on the vault,” she said. “There wasn’t any question as to if I could do any better.”

Caires’ winning vault score was 9.525, and she also posted a score of 8.775 to win the uneven bars discipline.

Westview coach Diane Wavrik dedicated the school’s crown to the 2020 team, which could not compete for a CIF title.

“We had a real strong team in 2020, and we needed to keep our focus for two years,” said Wavrik, who also coached the Wolverines to the Avocado League championship in her 14th year at Westview. “We have four seniors from that team, and our biggest asset was our depth. We had a lot of girls who could step forward.

“This is such a unified group, and they worked very hard through the COVID and kept focus on what their goal was.”

The other individual champion in the optional competition was Easton Haemmerle of West Hills, who won both the beam and the floor en route to a second-place all-around score

of 36.60.

Rounding out the top five all-around placers were Leiana Takeda of Rancho Bernardo in third, Mia Carpenter of Torrey Pines in fourth, and Ashley Carroll of La Costa Canyon in fifth.

Westview edged host Mt. Carmel in the team scoring by two points. The Wolverines totaled 221.07 points, and the Sundeils, coached by Monique Lamphiere-Tamayoshi, were the runner-up with 219.40

points.

Lauren Magno of Mt. Carmel was the compulsory allaround champion with a score of 38.475.

DENIS POROY FOR THE U-T La Costa Canyon’s Ashley Carroll competes in floor exercise during the all-around at the CIF gymnastics finals. Carroll finished in fifth place.