By: Angela Li

Being a gymnast is already super hard because lots of physical and mental strength is needed, but what would make it even harder is if you are a child under twelve in British Gymnastics. A big review of the practices of British Gymnastics produced shocking results. What they saw was children being mistreated as they were sat on by coaches, forced to do rigorous training even when they were injured, and worst of all, forced to sit in store cupboards if they cried or refused to do a skill during training.

To make matters even worse, around 75% of the British Gymnastics’ members are children under the age of 12, making them easy targets for the coaches and other staff. You must imagine the pain they had to go through, as one Team GB player said that the behavior from the coaches and other staff was ‘child abuse, and another talked negatively about how she and her sister were treated. “This behavior included physical chastisement, inappropriate training on injury, the enforcement of excessive training hours and training loads leading to physical pain and exhaustion beyond acceptable limits,” said Anne Whyte QC, the lawyer asked to lead the review on British Gymnastics.

Athletes were also prevented from using the toilet and refused to drink water even during long practice sessions! This kind of inappropriate behavior affected the athletes both physically and mentally. But this story has a happy ending.

All 306 pages of Anne Whyte’s review of the horrible conditions experienced by the young athletes were put into good use. The UK Sport and Sport England organizations accepted the findings and endorsed all the recommendations made. “The gymnasts’ experiences shared in this Review are harrowing and distressing to read. No one in sport should ever be subjected to such abuse,” they said in a statement.

British Gymnastics, the sport’s governing body, added it was for changing the sport for the better and apologized to all the brave child athletes who stepped forward.

Link: