Victoria Loftus
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Sport: Artistic Gymnastics Age: 16 Club: Dartford Gymnastics Club Key achievements:
Sporting ambitions: She hopes to win a gold medal at a major international games. |
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Victoria Loftus achieved her sporting ambition at the 2007 Special Olympics in Shanghai by winning a gold medal in the vault. Her performance was also enhanced with three bronze medals for her beam, bars and her overall performance in the Special Olympics Level 1 category.
The Special Olympics was the highlight of a tough year of injury, illness and training for the Medway-born gymnast.
Victoria is 15 years old and was born 12 weeks prematurely, weighing just 1lb 4oz (568g) and measuring just 10 inches (25cm) long. She spent the first four and a half months of her life in the special care baby unit of the former All Saints Hospital, Chatham, much of that time on an artificial breathing machine.
At the time she was one of the smallest babies in the world to survive. Despite this very rocky start to life, Victoria has grown into a pretty, lively teenager who has a love of gymnastics.
Victoria’s first competition was in October 2002 in Poole, Dorset. She won a gold medal for her beam routine and a silver medal for her vault and has continued to win medals at all levels since.
Victoria’s achievements are all the more impressive because her learning difficulties and hearing impairment affect her listening and communication skills. She has to concentrate and practice very hard to learn new moves and to remember the routines.
Her career rose to a new level in June 2006 when she was selected to represent Great Britain in the Special Olympic World Games to be held in Shanghai, China, in October 2007. After recovering from an ankle injury sustained early in 2007, Victoria got back to training 12 hours per week and attending GB gymnastic training camps ahead of the biggest competition of her life.
All the hard work was rewarded with her excellent, gold medal-winning performance in China.
For information on the Special Olympics visit www.sogb.org.uk.
To find out more about the squad for the Special Olympics, Team GB 2007, visit www.teamspecialolympicsgb.org.uk/archive.html.
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