Gymnastics has been a part of Marissa Rosen's life for a very long time.
The 16-year-old Fairfax resident began to do gymnastics at the age of 2 while living and growing up in California. She moved all the way up to being a level 10 gymnast and will start her competitive season in Gaithersburg on Jan. 14 at the Maryland Classic.
Rosen's life has undergone a number of changes in recent months. Her father works in the federal government and had to move the family from California to this area last summer.
But Rosen had little trouble getting set up with gymnastics in this area. She hooked up with Kelli Hill's Gymnastics Training Center in Gaithersburg.
Rosen had trained in California at the Golden Bear Gymnastics Academy on the campus of the University of California at Berkeley and All Olympians Gymnastics Center in Los Angeles under the coaching of Galina Marinova.
Marinova made the 1980 Olympics -- the ones hurt by the American boycott due to its dispute with Soviet politics -- while competing for Bulgaria. She also was one of several strong coaches that Rosen has had throughout her career.
Rosen stays busy in several ways between school and gymnastics. She trains 25 hours per week -- five hours, five days a week.
She also has found plenty of success in the classroom. Now at W.T. Woodson High in Fairfax, Rosen maintains over a 4.0 GPA. Rosen also faced some interesting decisions about the seriousness of her career at different points.
Her mother, Eleanore, said that Marissa has been asked about putting herself on the track to go to the Olympics, but because it requires an inordinate amount of time in so many ways, she declined.
'She's been asked to go to the Olympics many times,' said her mother. 'But she did not want to do it. She told me, 'Mom, this is great, but what do you do after that?' She wants to get her education and have a career.'
Even so, working hard at gymnastics takes a lot of time just for practices. While training in California, getting Rosen to practice required about three to four hours of daily driving to simply get to practice.
It's a little better here in Maryland -- only about two hours driving -- but the Rosens still have to battle traffic on 495 to get their daughter to the gym.
Rosen also spends a lot of time on the road traveling. She's competed in places like Hawaii, Las Vegas, Reno, San Diego -- and all around the West Coast. This year's competition schedule includes places like Missouri and San Jose (Cal.).
'It's always been her choice to be in gymnastics,' said her mother. 'She's always wanted to do it.'
Rosen has competed at the impressive level 10 for three years now. She was the alternate for the Level 10 Junior Olympic National team in 2003 and earlier this year earned a spot on the Junior Olympic Level 10 Region 1 National Team. In addition, she's attended top camps for gymnastics in different spots around the country.
Academics continue to be a strong priority for Rosen, whose main goals are to get a college scholarship for gymnastics and later find a career in something dealing with mathematics. She has a brother and sister (Brett and Nicole) and also is looking to find success away from the gymnastics mat.
Notes
...As of late Monday night, it looked like baseball was coming back to Washington. Here's to the politicians who played an unusual game to get it here. I've been covering the story and have seen some interesting things, but in the end, I'm not sure why some of these folks didn't realize that baseball will bring in a boatload of money to the District.
...We've been putting a lot of notes on Maryland guard Shay Doron in this column, but local sports fans really should keep an eye on her and the Terrapins as they might have a better year than the men's team. Doron will be one of the best guards in the Atlantic Coast Conference.
...The Shawn Green-Randy Johnson trade is up in the air, and I'll be sorry if Green does get traded. People on the East Coast don't know this, but Green has gone far, far out of his way to let people in the Los Angeles area know how important Judaism is to him. He makes community appearances, talks to Jewish organizations and does things many other athletes wouldn't. The trade would be a huge loss to the Los Angeles Jewish community -- hopefully he'd do the same good things in Phoenix if he goes to the Arizona Diamondbacks.
Article copyright Washington Jewish Week.
Photograph (Marissa Rosen performs jump on the balance beam.)
