Gyms in Virginia

[coachmolly]

I am in the beginning stages of looking at potential schools for my graduate work, one which is very high on my list is in Harrisonburg, Virginia. Gymnastics is my life and ideally, I would like to go to school in a place with at least one gym nearby where I could potentially coach a few hours a week. While I am content coaching rec. level classes, I would like the gym to have a team program for further opportunities down the road.
After much searching I have not been able to find much in the way of gyms in or around the Harrisonburg area. I found one rec. program out of JMU, but I'm not sure if that is still up and running. I know a few of the posters here are from Virginia, so I'm hoping you might be able to help.
You can reply here or PM me if you know of anyplace. Thanks in advance!

 

[superflipgirl]

I'd be happy to help you, but I'm not quite sure where Harrisonburg is. Can you tell me? Then I'll be able to tell you a gym in that area.

 

[coachmolly]

I'm not sure how to explain it, but I'll try. It's off of 81 in the Shenandoah Valley area. It's in the more Northern part of Virginia in the Western portion of the state, not too far from the West Virginia line.
It's on the opposite side of the more narrow northern part of the state than all the big DC suburb towns.
If that doesn't make any sense at all, here is a link to a map which will probably do a better job of explaining, but my description should help you find it , I'm terrible with written words.
http://www.virginia-map.org/virginia-road-map.gif

 

[superflipgirl]

Now that I see it on the map, it does seem kind of far away from any gyms I know about, but I'll try to help. It's not that far from Winchester, in Winchester there's Shenandoah Tumblers, Competitive Edge, and East Coast. It doesn't really seem far from Prince William County, There is GMS in Manassas and Apollo in Woodbridge. Those are all the gyms I can think of at the time but I'll tell you if I remember more in the area.

 

[gymdog]

The closest seem to be at least an hour from Harrisonburg. Possible I guess but that was just me looking geographically, with transportation in this state, who even knows, right. Winchester is a pretty straight shot up 81 though, but still an hour. I've heard of people doing it though. I guess it just depends on whether you have a reliable car and the time in your schedule with full time school. I elaborated on this via PM. But for those looking to move to this area and coaching with attending school I'd suggest looking for school programs of which there seem to be a few. Or trying to push the university to share space and start a competitive program.

 

[Tumblequeensmom]

Gymdog is correct. The closest gyms are in Winchester. The gyms a previous poster mentioned in Prince William County.... GMS, Apollo may look just as close on a map, but with the roads and transportation in that whole area... forget it. I knew that JMU has a "club" team (literally a student club) because they compete against Virginia Tech and other Universities. I was just on their website and it states that they do not have a coach, but would welcome one! So it may be worth it to drop an email just to see if there is some interest there! It looks like they practice every night from 7 - 9:00 p.m. They have about 30 members on the team. Of course the skill level will be all over the place, but I bet they have a lot of fun! See if this link will work for you!

UREC Sport Clubs

 

[coachmolly]

Thanks for all of the help! Maybe something will open up in the next few months, it's a long shot but I can always hope. Coaching a college club team would be a blast but I'm pretty sure I'm nowhere close to being considered qualified as I've only coached rec and compulsory levels. But thanks for all of the suggestions. I do have a good car, but an hour each way would be a lot of travel with going to school full time.
I found one high school in the area that looks like it has a team, maybe there are others. I guess I'll just need to keep a look out. Thanks again for all of the suggestions, I really appreciate it!

 

[Tams Mom]

I went to JMU, it is a great school. There used to be a NCAA team there, but it was disbanded. Some of the girls went on to the club team and some transfered to other schools. The coach for the team coached some rec classes, but I'm not sure if he did it on campus or at an outside facility. I will try to find out. He might have gone to coach at another school.