While many clubs were at the Waverley Classic this past weekend, there was also plenty of action going down in Gippsland at the Senior Gippsland Championships, held on the Saturday at Maffra Gymnastic Club. A smaller, regional affair on paper, but with East Gippsland Gym Club, Leongatha Gymnastic Club and host Maffra Gymnastic Club all showing up with some genuinely competitive gymnastics across Levels 4 to 7. The boys' program, run separately, was effectively a Maffra intra-club muster, ten gymnasts across three levels, all from the host club. Small field, but worth a look, so let's get into it.
Women's Artistic Gymnastics
LEVEL 4: LEONGATHA'S BIG DAY
Leongatha won the Level 4 team title on 110.825, ahead of Maffra's squad (107.795) and East Gippsland (107.1). The individual all-around went the other way: East Gippsland's Ruby Harley won outright. Leongatha still had the depth behind her: Leni Mattheson was 2nd all-around, with a share of silver on beam and outright silver on floor, and picked up an encouragement award along the way, per Leongatha's own recap. Kyra Johnston tied for 3rd overall but won both beam and floor outright, tied with Maffra's Elise Thompson, who topped vault. Florence Rooker won bars outright and added bronze on floor, and Chelsea Launder was runner-up on vault.
LEVEL 5: TOP FIVE SEPARATED BY 0.65
East Gippsland Gym Club's Mischa Waddell won the day's tightest field, Level 5, on 36.85, vault 9.7, bars 9.2, beam 9.25, floor 8.7. It was close all the way down: clubmate Priya Waddell was 2nd on 36.45, and Leongatha Gymnastic Club filled the next three places, Samara Johnston (36.325), Billi Denblyden (36.275) and Annabelle Walkley (36.2). Just 0.65 covered the top five.
The team event told a different story about depth. East Gippsland's squad won it outright on 110.475, ahead of Leongatha's squad on 109.15. Maffra didn't have a single Level 5 team, it had three, filling 3rd (106.325), 4th (103.35) and 5th (99.675), with East Gippsland's second squad rounding out the field on 94.2.
LEVEL 6: MAFFRA FILLS SIX OF THE TOP SEVEN
Level 6 was as one-sided as Level 5 was tight. Maffra Gymnastic Club's Indiana McKay won on 35.125, with clubmate Emmy Gieschen 2nd (34.925) and Tahli Rae 3rd (34.05). The only gymnast to break up the home run was East Gippsland's Layla Wright in 4th, before Maffra picked back up with Alyson Ryan (5th), Ella de Luca (6th) and Angelina Ryan (7th), six of the field's top seven places. Maffra was also the only club to enter a Level 6 team, posting a modest 105.525.
LEVEL 7: GUILLOT HOLDS OFF MCDONNELL BY 0.25
In the smallest field of the day, Maffra's Savannah Guillot won Level 7 on 42.25, just 0.25 clear of clubmate Alyssa McDonnell on 42.0. East Gippsland's Lacey McKerrell was 3rd on 40.85. East Gippsland was the only club to field a Level 7 team, taking that title on 116.45.
THE ONE TO FEEL GOOD ABOUT
Not every good story from a competition is a podium finish. In that same Level 5 field, East Gippsland's Ruby Shieffelbein may not have made the podium, but her improvement is worth a look. Two weeks earlier at the Aerodynamix Invitational, she recorded no score on vault, finishing on 16.95 from her other three events. Setting vault aside for a fair comparison, her combined bars, beam and floor score climbed from that 16.95 to 21.175 at Gippsland, up across all three, roughly 1.25 to 1.55 a piece. She also posted a full score on vault this time, 7.6, rounding out the all-around.
Leongatha's Facebook recap had its own version of the same idea, highlighting two of its younger gymnasts by their moments rather than their scores: one who landed a back walkover on floor in competition after a run of inconsistent attempts in the gym, and another who completed a kip, in both warm-up and competition, having only managed it alone once before.
Men's Artistic Gymnastics
AN INTRA-CLUB AFFAIR
The MAG side of the Senior Gippsland Championships was, in effect, Maffra's own boys' program having a competition against itself: all ten gymnasts across Levels 2 to 4 were from the host club. That doesn't make the gymnastics any less real. Maffra's Oscar Glynn won Level 2 on 52.3, floor 9.3, pommel 8.0, rings 9.0, vault 8.0, parallel bars 9.0, high bar 9.0, well clear of Jacob McKay on 49.0 and Rory Esler on 44.2. Levels 3 and 4 were single-athlete fields, won by Andy Cresia (47.4) and Harvey O'Brien (47.6) respectively.
NAVY EDGES WHITE BY 0.4
The closest team race of the entire competition, WAG or MAG, was Maffra's own Level 2 team event: the club's Navy squad scored 136.6 to White's 136.2, a 0.4-point margin across six apparatus.
Full results from the 2026 Senior Gippsland Championships are up on the results pages for WAG and MAG.
