2023 Scottish Artistic Championships | Ones to Watch
The 2023 Scottish National Artistic Gymnastics Championships take place on Friday 17 to Sunday 19 February in Perth. Building on last year’s event, the competition takes places over three days with over 140 competitors and plenty of exciting gymnastics to watch at Bell’s Sports Centre.
Day tickets for the championships are available from £8 with younger gymnasts competing on Friday evening. Junior, senior and disability gymnasts compete for all-around medals on Saturday and individual apparatus finals take place on Sunday with plenty of phenomenal skills on show over the weekend.
As well as Scottish gymnasts competing for national titles, this year our competition acts a precursor to the European Youth Olympic Festival, Junior European Championships and World Artistic Championships with talented and experienced gymnasts taking the opportunity to start their campaigns for Great Britain selection early with scores from home nations championships used in consideration for selection for these events and for those hoping to start their path to Paris 2024.
South Essex’s Pavel Karnejenko will be hoping to build on his Team Scotland debut performance in Birmingham last year where he finished in fifth place in the individual all-around competition. More recently, he has been re-selected onto the British Gymnastics senior development squad. He won the senior national men’s all-around title at last year’s championships, and you can expect shows of strength, particularly on rings and parallel bars this time around.
Cameron Lynn (West Lothian) joined Pavel as part of the Birmingham team and finished on the podium at the 2022 Scottish championships. He has been working to build his difficulty across the apparatus at BG squad camps, and will be hoping to better his bronze all-around medal in 2023. Keep an eye on his parallel bars and vault where he has been particularly focussed on achieving success over the last year.
Katie Ferries from City of Aberdeen won gold at espoir level in last year’s competition and picked up a gold all-around medal in November’s British FIG qualifier competition. For the 2023 Scottish championships, it will be a first at junior level, and with a consistent performance on floor and vault – we’re expecting to see a solid all-around competition from the 13-year-old.
Eilidh Gorrell has been on a high after competing with Team Scotland last year. With an open field this year in the senior women’s competition due to injury and recent retirements, this could be her year to claim the national title. We’re expecting to see plenty of personality and thrilling performances on beam and floor.
Max Whitlock OBE will be making a welcome return to competition at the Scottish National Championships in Perth as he has eyes set on a place on Team GB for his potential fourth Olympic Games selection in Paris. A veteran all-around competitor and building back to his medal winning performance levels on pommel, we are thrilled to see Max take to the competition floor once more and showcase his incredible skill.
Reuben Ward is also set to follow a phenomenal year after picking up a series of international medals including team silver at the European Youth Olympic Festival and two bronze medals at the Junior European Championships. Last year, we saw the City of Manchester gymnast top the podium at our home championships, and we’re expecting to see another strong all-around performance in his last year as a junior gymnast.
With disability gymnasts fully integrated into the programme for the 2023 Scottish National Championships, we’re looking forward to seeing West Lothian’s Megan Docherty compete for medals in Saturday’s all-around competition. A finalist in the senior gymnast of the year award at the 2022 Scottish Gymnastics Awards, and securing gold in vault during the 2022 British Championships, we’re expecting to see strong performances particularly on beam and vault this weekend.
It is set to be a fantastic weekend of gymnastics, and we hope you are able to join us in Perth. We will be sharing highlights across our Instagram and social media channels over the weekend, so be sure to follow us to see who’ll lift the trophies and make sure you’re supporting the gymnasts using #ScotGymChamps.