Rachel Groggel on the balance beam

Any athlete who earns a WPIAL Championship medal knows how difficult it was to get that piece of metal hanging around their neck. It takes long hours, buckets of sweat, coaches who push you beyond your limits, and lots of teamwork--even in the individual sports like wrestling, swimming and gymnastics. It helps if you can practice after school with your friends that go to your school. That team interaction can press you to become one of the absolute best in the WPIAL. But there's only one little problem with that:

What if you ARE the team?

That was the case of Rachel Groggel this winter. The Riverview High School freshman represented the school in the WPIAL Gymnastics Championships in February as an independent athlete. The school has been helpful to its first gymnast. "Jake Cappa [Riverview Athletic Director] and Tom Graham [Principal] are very supportive and I thank them that they gave me an opportunity to compete in high school gymnastics," Rachel said. Her mother, Jody, acted as the official school coach for her.

Rachel Groggel won two medals in the WPIALs, representing Riverview High School

She's been in gymnastics almost as long as she's been able to walk, and today still trains 16 hours a week in Aspinwall. Rachel is on the Junior Olympic team, is rated at skill level 10 (one step below the Olympics) and competes in many tournaments on a regular basis. Riverview's Lone Gymnast qualified to compete in all four WPIAL championship events: the Vault, the Bars, the Floor Exercise, and the Balance Beam. Her favorite event is the floor exercise, a combination of dance and astounding leaps, amazing flips, spinning cartwheels, and death-defying somersaults, all set to a musical theme from the Olympics. It sends me into cardiac arrest when I see these gymnasts shooting through the air, twisting like pretzels and turning like buzz saws at what seems to be 90 miles an hour and 100 feet off the ground, and I'm just watching! I had to ask Rachel if it was scary when she was in mid-air doing a flip.

Oh yeah, it is, replied the Lone Gymnast. "But it's more mental than physical," Rachel said. It takes an extra measure of self-confidence when it's time to go, but she is able to do it. Even after breaking her foot on the beam and getting a concussion on the Bars? "It's hard to do those routines again," she admitted. But the challenge has not stopped her. Rachel got back on that horse. And being the only one on her school team didn't stop her either. The proof is in the metal around her neck.

In February, after her first year competing in the WPIAL, Riverview's Lone Gymnast Rachel Groggel won Bronze and Silver medals at the WPIAL Gymnastics Championships in the Intermediate I (the Gold division and second highest skill level.) She vaulted to second place in the Floor routine for the Silver and third in Bars for the Bronze medal.