Lidiia Iakovleva named in Aussie senior team for the Rhythmic Gymnastics World Championships

Lidiia Iakovleva’s rapid trajectory in gymnastics has her on course for the 2020 Olympics, with the teenager elevated into the Australian senior team to compete at the 37th FIG Rhythmic Gymnastics World Championships in Baku next month.

Lidiia Iakovleva’s rapid trajectory in gymnastics continues at pace, with the teenager elevated into the Australian senior team to compete at the 37th FIG Rhythmic Gymnastics World Championships in Baku next month.

Iakovleva, 16, from the Robertson-based Aspire Gymnastics Academy in Brisbane, has made the national side in four apparatus disciplines.

“I thought I might make it in one or two, not four,’’ the Wakerley resident said.

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Selection continued a swift rise through the ranks for Iakovleva following last year’s selection at the Youth Olympic Games.

She said having tasted the international spotlight at the Youth Olympics gave her valuable experience. “It was amazing,’’ Iakovleva said.

But just 12 months later she is now on course for selection in the 2020 Olympic Games to be staged in Tokyo.

Lidiia Iakovleva has made the Australian senior gymnastics team.

Iakovleva was keeping her aims simple for the world championships.

“I am hoping to get four clean routines, no drops, and at the worlds,’’ she said.

“I am also aiming to score over 60 in all of my apparatus.’’

Iakovleva leaves on Sunday for a five week tour which will include a World Cup event in Russia prior to the world championships in Baku.

A past student of Moreton Bay College who now undertakes international distance education, the teenager said her achievement to make the Australian senior team would not sink in until she she prepared for competition ahead of the World Cup.

Iakovleva, whose mother Iuliia is a renowned coach, started gymnastics aged seven in Russia and continued in the sport at Premier Gymnastics when she arrived in Brisbane aged eight in 2011.

A photo of Lidiia Iakovleva in 2016 when she was selected for Australian junior rythmic gymnastics team. Picture: Peter Cronin

Iakovleva was a natural. In 2013 at her first junior national championships, her then coach told her not to worry if she came in the top 20. But Iakovleva finished third.

A turning point in her career came when she went to a training camp in Russia organised by her mother at the end of 2015-16, then returned to represent Australia at the Pacific Rim Championships in the USA.

“It was then I started to realise I have to give everything to the sport, give 100 per cent in everything I do,’’ she said.