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Horsing around works well in Willowbrook victory vs. Addison Trail

Like some female gymnasts who would live happily ever after in a world where the balance beam didn't exist, there are male gymnasts who feel the same way about the pommel horse.

Taming that beast has rattled even some of the best gymnasts, but apparently not those at Willowbrook.

The Warriors posted the top four scores on pommel horse during Thursday's West Suburban Gold meet against Addison Trail and used their dominance on the despised-by-many apparatus to earn a 129.3 to 124 victory.

Cooper Ross led the way with a 7.4 and was followed by Saad Omar's 7.1, Collin Donaldson's 6.7 and Brendan Bailey's 6.6.

"Today was awesome on pommel," Warriors coach Caleb Strejc said. "Cooper and Saad hit and Collin and Brendan both fell, but they got up and made their travel down, which was huge because that's an element group, so the fact that they got up and hit it the second time was awesome. And that was the first time they've done that well on horse so it was pretty exciting."

Strejc obviously has seen incredible performances on pommel horse. He placed 10th in the state when he was the all-around champion in 2010, was teammates with Kyle Carmona at York when he won it in 2008 and took second in 2007 and coached Adam Sousa last year when he was the all-around champion and tied for fifth on the apparatus.

"It's a fun group and that group practices horse every day," Strejc said. "They'll usually do one day off on an event, but they do a lot of horse and that's kind of showing with those competitive scores."

Senior Brendan Bailey and junior Danny Saldana led the winners as Bailey edged Saldana, 42.6 to 42.3 in the all-around. Bailey, whose best event is parallel bars, won that as well as still rings, while Saldana won high bar.

"It was a pretty good meet, although I could've done better with some form adjustments," Saldana said. "Last year I did JV dual meets and then went up to varsity for invites, but now that I'm varsity, I'm really liking it."

It helps that Willowbrook is enjoying some early success, despite losing Sousa to graduation and specialist Isaiah Lewis moving out of the district.

"We went up a few points since Saturday (Niles West Invite)," Strejc said. "And the funny thing about Saturday's meet is we placed higher than we did last year even without Adam and Isaiah, and the only teams that beat us were with guys with previous club experience. So I'm really impressed with these guys who all started gymnastics in high school."

Noah Pulli placed second on high bar and Sean Luner was right behind Bailey on still rings for second place for Willowbrook.

Addison Trail, which was competing for the first time in 10 days, got a huge boost with the return of sophomore Matt Wojdak, who had been injured.

Wojdak won vault with an 8.7 and floor with a 9.4. He had a 9.3 while tying for sixth in the state on floor last May.

"He had a stellar floor routine where he looked like he was on par from where left off last year," Blazers coach Mike Galfi said. "And he had a really good vault. He's taking it nice and slow with it being his first meet, but he looked good."

Jake Bastian took second on floor, third on vault and scored a 38.9 as Addison Trail's lone all-arounder. The junior didn't compete last year but has proved that he's ready now.

"He didn't have an opportunity to compete last year but he has such a strong work ethic and has picked up skills left and right," Galfi said. "He had a really good meet and there's a lot more potential in him."

Senior leader Eric Estrada placed third on still rings, Jakub Sitko was second on parallel bars and Caleb Michalski tied for third on high bar for the Blazers.

"Eric's got the best work ethic in the gym and continues to push every day," Galfi said. "Jakub seems to be getting better every time out and Caleb is our rock. He hits all his sets and is very consistent."

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