Olympic dreams

An 11-year-old girl from Tucumcari holds dreams of becoming a member of the Team USA gymnastics team for the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris, and she is inspiring other children in town to consider taking up the sport.

To think it all started because of her viewing YouTube videos online.

For the last 18 months, Aliyah Marez has trained twice a week at KATZ Gymnastics in Clovis. She's in the middle of competition season, with the team state championships coming up in mid-March.

Aliyah is at the Silver level of skill and will try out for Gold in about two weeks. From there, she aims to reach the next tier of Platinum and the highest, Diamond.

Aliyah said she became interested in doing gymnastics herself about two years ago when she viewed a gymnastics channel on YouTube and saw a girl about her age.

"She was doing all of these flips," she said. "I wanted to do them. I thought, 'I bet if I try my hardest, I could probably do that.' So I started teaching myself."

Aliyah always showed plenty of physical agility since getting her first trampoline at age 4. (She's on trampoline No. 3 after wearing out two.) But after seeing the online videos and teaching herself gymnastic moves on a trampoline and uneven bars in the yard, she said she was "begging" her parents Jose and Veronica to take her to a gym to learn more.

"At first, I thought it was a phase," Veronica said. "She went to go visit my cousin in Arizona for a month. I told her, 'Put her in a gymnastics class there and see how it goes.'"

After that first class in Phoenix, Veronica said the instructor asked her cousin, "How long has she been doing this? She's really good."

"They wanted to put me on the team right away," Aliyah said. "They thought I lived in Phoenix."

It wasn't long after that when Aliyah enrolled in classes at KATZ. Apparently she was a quick study.

"I was in a Level One class for three sessions, and they moved me to pre-team," she said.

Aliyah said she was only slightly nervous the first time she was on a professional-level balance beam 4 feet off the ground. The one she uses at home sits only a few inches off the ground. She quickly adjusted and says she's only fallen twice and suffered no injuries in 18 months at KATZ.

She now competes in the full gamut - floor exercises, uneven bars, vault table and balance beam. In addition to fine-tuning her skills, KATZ has built her strength and conditioning with rope climbing, handstand pushups, lunges and more.

Veronica said her daughter always was self-motivated. She said during the summer, it wasn't unusual for her to work on her gymnastics in the yard from 10 a.m. until dark.

One of her parents or grandparents drives her the 85 miles to KATZ as she does homework in the car to keep up her straight-A grades at Tucumcari. She also plays volleyball and is a member of a summer traveling basketball team.

But the Olympics - and choosing a college to further her gymnastics career - remain in her long-term goals. She wants to attend UCLA but also is considering the University of Oklahoma, both which boast strong gymnastics programs.

Last summer, she attended Bart Conner's gymnastics camp in Oklahoma and met his wife, fellow gold medalist gymnast Nadia Comaneci.

"He helped me on the bars and how to keep our legs straight," Aliyah said.

Veronica often posts photos and videos of her daughter on Facebook, inspiring other Tucumcari children to consider the sport.

"I have parents messaging me all the time, asking about it," Veronica said.

Aliyah also teaches other children in the neighborhood the basics of gymnastics. Later that afternoon, she was scheduled to teach two Tucumcari senior cheerleaders who to do a backhand spring for an upcoming competition.

"She's really patient and will teach other kids," Veronica said. "If we have friends come over with their kids, she's out there teaching them how to do it."