The CSS 2 Bucharest gym is in a central area of Bucharest, less than 100m from Obor Station so many people could bring their kids here to do gymnastics.

Clubul Sportiv Scolar nr. 2

Str Ferdinand I, Nr. 141, Sector 2, Bucuresti (zona Gara de Est – Obor), Romania

TRANSLATION: The Medal Factory (29.10.2011) – (c) DigiSport Tv

In today´s episode of The Medal Factory, we´ll get to know the gymnasts and coaches of Bucharest´s Nr. 2 School Sports Club (CSS 2 Bucuresti). Inside the gym, the little gymnasts are training happily while their coaches are putting in a lot of passion, patience and responsibility. All of them have been gymnasts, from both Artistic and Rhythmic gymnastics. They all have high expectations from the girls although the working conditions are not up to the usual standards. They get motivation from the children who want to reach the highest level.

Andreea Raducan: Romanian gymnastics has always had results. People need to understand these results start at the very bottom, in the clubs and from the gymnasts we are meeting today.

We already know the number of gymnasts is coming down every year. There are many reasons behind this: either parents cannot take their children to the gym, cannot support the costs or the kids give up the minute training gets a little harder.

“Unfortunately, the difference from previous years is that we have to work with all the kids who come in. There are situations in which they come in, they like it but when they have to train every day they give up, either because their parents cannot bring them to the gym every day or because they think gymnastics is very hard. Despite all this, we still have a number of kids working here every day, winning medals. One of our gymnasts, Anda Butuc, was selected in September for the Junior National team in Deva and she will be going to the Worlds in September….I wish it was Worlds, I meant the National Championship. I´m sure she will medal there. I hope she will stay healthy and get to a World Championship one day, she has all the necessary qualities to make it.”

Dorina Cordus: Nowadays, the kids who come to do gymnastics, who are consistent and have a chance to make the National teams are those who are brought in by their parents. Their parents want them to do gymnastics, the kids do all kinds of stuff at home and they are sent to gymnastics. These are the kids who make it. When you look into a child´s eyes and see that he wants to do more, wants you to teach him, wants to do what bigger gymnasts are doing you forget all your problems and lack of motivation. The child draws you in and makes you want to help him.

Andreea Raducan: How do you communicate with these little gymnasts? Why did you choose to coach girls and not boys? Is there a need for a male coach in a girls´gym or this was your own choice?

Ghita Rotaru: This is my third year as a teacher, I used to teach at a school in my home town. I tried to be a coach at the Resita gym, where there are only boys, but I couldn´t win a spot there. I chose to come here because I want to continue what I started, even if coaching girls is something new for me. There is always a need of a male coach in the gym, it makes a big difference.

Andreea Raducan: We´ve always had problems at bars, which is an apparatus where a male coach is very useful. Is this where you work with the girls, do you like it more?

Ghita Rotaru: Not necessarily, although it is well known that a guy does not have anything to do with beam.

Andreea Raducan: This is exactly why I was asking.

Ghita Rotaru: It´s one of the apparatus where a guy doesn´t really have the knowledge. When I came here in September, the girls were surprised to have a male coach but now I´m happy they appreciate me and we get along really well.

If in the USA you have hundreds of gymnastics clubs, in Romania you only find less than 30. In developed countries, parents invest serious amounts of money for their kids to be initiated in gymnastics. Here, funds are very low, performance is expensive and not just financially…Those who choose to go this way have to fulfill one condition: to change the idea that childhood is comfortable. Results are based on will and constant hard work.

Andreea Raducan: We always need a team to be able to have results, I have here with me one such example: Alina Fratila and Dorina Cordus. Alina, you were an elite gymnast yourself. I´d like to know how different is this sport today?

Alina Fratila: Unfortunately, it is very different because kids are also different. They have been raised differently, they are very sensitive and used to have their way. Nobody asked us anything, we were set on a path and had to execute.

Andreea Raducan: Are they less willing to do sacrifices nowadays?

Alina Fratila: Definitely.

Andreea Raducan: Dorina, you were a Rhythmic gymnast.

Dorina Cordus: Yes, I´m glad you brought this up. I gave up this sport, although I was an elite Rhythmic gymnast and the number one gymnast of this club at that time. I think Artistic gymnastics is more interesting, it´s more powerful. I´ve had problems to be accepted as I came from another area, I wasn´t an Artistic gymnast, but I fought through it.

Andreea Raducan: I have to admit I love Rhythmic gymnastics, I think we need many of the qualities we find in Rhythmic gymnastics also in Artistic so I don´t see any problem. How difficult or how beautiful is working with kids?

Dorina Cordus: It´s great and you need to love kids to do this kind of work. You always try to teach them what you feel you didn´t do as a gymnast. They also teach us a lot, they update us…

Andreea Raducan: How do you motivate them? They have to train daily…

Alina Fratila: I think they come here because they love their coach. Even if we ask a lot from them and want them to be perfect, they are fond of us and see a role model in us. This is why they keep coming.

Andreea Raducan: Are there days when they tell you they don´t want to train?

Dorina Cordus: Definitely, they did that the other day…

Alina Fratila: They didn´t only tell us, they showed us. This did not happen only one day. But we are here to understand and help them along.

Andreea Raducan: Bianca Abrudean was an elite gymnast and I´m going to ask her about her coaching experience. Was it a challenge for you?

Bianca Abrudean: It was a challenge, but it was made easier by my being an elite gymnast for 12 years. I learned how to get closer to them, how to talk to them. We have to be friends in the first place.

Andreea Raducan: How do you motivate them, how do you make them understand they need to train every day if they want to go far?

Bianca Abrudean: We have a couple of little girls who come in daily, they like it. If they are having a bad day, we play with them, we do competitions so that they don´t feel they are working. For now, they must feel they are coming here to play, even if this is hard play….

Andreea Raducan: Mr Traian Marinescu, the director of the club is here with me and will tell us more about CSS 2 Bucharest.

Traian Marinescu: Hello, I´m glad you are here as any opportunity we have to make the activities of this club known to the public is welcomed. It would be nice for everyone to know that the gym we are in right now is in a central area of Bucharest, less than 100m from Obor Station so many people could bring their kids here to do gymnastics. And we have a big offer for sports, not only gymnastics, we have 14 other departments for them to choose from.

Andreea Raducan: How many kids come to the club?

Traian Marinescu: Officially we have 1438 registered, but there are more kids coming in. I´m glad you´re here not only to try to bring in more kids, but also some sponsors. People can see that kids are doing sports in Romania and maybe someone will think about helping us. Right now, we are preparing an ad campaign through which we are trying to bring in some sponsorship. As with all the other sports, we are suffering from the lack of an attractive sponsorship law but maybe this will be changed in the near future. The management of the club is focused on improving the training conditions for the kids. We are not doing bad, but we could do better. We are proud of the gymnasts and their results, gymnastics is one of our best departments.

In future episodes of The Medal Factory: meet the Romanian gymnastics hopefuls, the gymnasts from Bucharest´s Nr. 2 School Sports Club.

“I won 3 medals at the School Championships.”

“What is your favorite apparatus?”

“Beam.”

Andreea Raducan: There is a tight relationship between Artistic and Rhythmic gymnastics at CSS 2 Bucharest. Ancuta Gheorghedan is a former Rhythmic gymnast herself.

Ancuta Gheorghedan: Yes, I was selected at school when I was 7. I was an elite gymnast for 7 years. I wanted to be a sports teacher, I never thought I would be a coach and more so of Artistic gymnastics. When I came to Bucharest I discovered another form of gymnastics, I liked it and I decided to stay.

Andreea Raducan: You put a lot of passion into what you are doing. How do you communicate with the little ones?

Ancuta Gheorghedan: You need to like kids to be able to work with them. I am very fond of them, it´s really nice.

Andreea Raducan: Do they come to you to complain when they don´t want to train?

Ancuta Gheorghedan: They tell me they love me when they don´t want to do something.

Andreea Raducan: So how do you motivate them and make them understand that they need to train in order to be successful?

Ancuta Gheorghedan: I get serious sometimes and sometimes I play with them. If you are not serious, you cannot do anything…

Andreea Raducan: I know you are a kindergarten teacher. How do you try to bring kids into the gym?

“This is the reason why I started working at the kindergarten. I noticed parents had trouble bringing their kids to the gym and wait for them for a couple of hours so I started working there to try to determine the kids to do some gymnastics elements. If they want to do more than what they can do there, I can bring the most talented of them into the gym with the consent of their parents. Gymnastics then turns into a necessity for the kids and they stay.”

Andreea Raducan: What are your needs? I know you need many other things than what is already available in the gym. How do you bring sponsors in?

“We´ve managed to do this throughout the years, but all the sponsorships were based on friendships. Because the law is not favorable, we´ve only managed to get to those people who love sports. This, of course, is not enough. For example, this 35 year old gym has never had a floor podium, the most loved apparatus. We need new apparatus as they have changed, like the vaulting table. When we didn´t have something, we tried to gather some money with the help of the parents to buy mats, leos but this is still not enough. We really needs some sponsors or some help from the government, the city halls to be able to help these kids.”

Andreea Raducan: The most important thing is for the message to get to those people who could help the club. Because we are talking about kids, about elite gymnastics, we only need some willingness so that things can get solved.

“We hope that these little girls can get to the heart of those who can help.”

Many gymnasts from CSS 2 Bucharest reached the Junior National team in Deva.

Andreea Raducan: I know there are some gymnasts trained by you who reached the Deva team.

Yes, Ramona Zaharuc, Elena Velicu, Florina Dan, Georgiana Sulugiuc but they faced 2 problems in their struggle for top results: one is the health problem and the other is the reward. When a gymnast sees their colleagues being rewarded by their clubs for the same results she achieved and her club cannot do the same, she gets frustrated. That is why we really wanted to find some support for the club, not just find people who want to help on our own. I don´t know how this would be possible but we are hopeful.”

In the next episode of The Medal Factory: Diana Chelaru.

“Gymnastics is a nice, disciplined sport. The viewers must know this sport can help you build a future for yourself. Kids dream about being on the podium and getting to the Olympics.”

RGF