Title: Men's Gymnastics Team Breaks Multiple School Records
By: David Golombek, Team Member

In their final dual home meet of the season, the MIT Men's Gymnastic Team set new records in 5 categories, and came close to beating Division 1 ranked University of Vermont. With an overall score of 180.5 to U. Vermont's 182.55, MIT broke an 8 year old team record, and increased it's season high by more than 7 points. With two more meets against U. Vermont to go this season, at New Englands and the Regional Championships, MIT has a strong chance to beat U. Vermont later this season.

Leading the team, Rob Cooper '97 set a new all-around record for the school with an impressive 48.35 points, and Chris Ellefson '95 had a personal best all-around score of 47.00. They helped lead the 4 man team score to it's new all-around record, plus team records on rings, high bar, and parallel bars.

Floor exercise, usually a weaker event for the MIT team, went very well and got the meet off to an excellent beginning. David Golombek '98, Van Van '97, and Art Shectman '95 all threw clean routines to help get the event started. Ellefson and Cooper finished off the round, both making impromptu changes to their routines that helped them earn an 8.05 and 8.95 respectively. U. Vermont lead slightly after this first event, 33.35 to 30.95.

Pommel Horse, next in olympic order, similarly went well for MIT. Andy McCraith '98 started off the event with a well executed routine. Van, Ellefson, Andy Lobban '97, and Cooper followed, all posting excellent individual scores. MIT pulled closer to U. Vermont with these scores, but still trailed by a point and a half.

Brian Clarkson '97 and Geof Phillipe '95 led off the rings competition, both performing very strong routines. The top four scores, contributed by Lobban, Cooper, Scott Lazerwith '95, and Ellefson, summed to 33.8, and broke the 4 man rings record, and also place MIT ahead of U. Vermont.

Vault continued MIT's streak of good perfomances, with Shectman, Phillippe, Golombek, McCraith, and Ellefson all throwing handsprings for good scores. Cooper finished off the event with a perfectly landed handspring front. MIT remained in the lead through this event, but U. Vermont managed to catch up a bit.

Golombek and Van had led the Parallel bars team, followed by Lazerwith, Cooper, Lobban, and Ellefson, who collectively set yet another team record. Despite the continued high scores, U. Vermont jumped back into the lead by a one point margin.

MIT was unable to overcome this gap in the final event, high bar, despite a final record setting attempt. Van, Shectman, Ellefson, Cooper, and Lobban all swung very cleanly in this attempt to even up the scores. However, U. Vermont managed to extend it's lead slightly, ending with a final score 1.95 points above that of MIT.

This Saturday, MIT will be hosting the final regular season competition of the year, the New Englands, including highly ranked teams such as the University of Massachusetts, and Springfield. The meet will begin at 1:00, Saturday the 4th in Du Pont Gymnasium.