The gold medal-winning teen talks flips, tricks and tumbling plans for the future

Amy Campbell spends a lot of her time in a spin and since taking up gymnastics aged just four and then specialising in tumbling from the age of seven, she hasn’t stopped. A member of the GB tumbling squad, Amy recently scooped a gold medal in the Loule Cup in Portugal which was her third international assignment.

The Loule Cup is a an annual trampoline and tumbling competition that attracts teams from around the world including Russia, Greece, Sweden, France, Germany and Japan among others. A win was a massive achievement for the tumbling teen and a personal best score in her final tumbling pass was the icing on the cake.

Now in Year 9 at Edgbaston High School for Girls, Amy found out about her GB call up aged 11. Training four days a week at Revolution Gymnastics in Harborne as well as working on fitness at home for at least an hour a day, Amy’s schedule is jam-packed. Naturally there are sacrifices Amy makes, like not being able to celebrate friend’s birthdays on occasion, but she takes it in her stride.

With World Championships every year apart from Olympic years, Amy has much to work towards in the sporting arena as well as approaching a more intense time at school. There’s also a campaign to make tumbling an Olympic sport which she’s hopeful about too. Ambitions are high and Amy would love to follow in the footsteps of her hero, the ‘incredible’ American artistic gymnast Simone Biles who wowed in Rio.

Lucky enough not to have suffered any injuries other than requiring a bit of strapping to an ankle, Amy’s in good shape. We’ll be following her progress closely and willing her on to more golden glory.