In the summer of 1972, 7-year-old Roger Montoya sat in front of his television in Denver, Colo., watching, for the first time, the gymnastics competition of the Summer Olympics in Munich, Germany.
Montoya, now 44, said he fell in love with gymnastics after watching all the athleticism especially from the Chinese team.
“I started flipping all over the house,” Montoya said. “So my mother sought out programs for that. My mother and father saw that I had talent. We were in a poor area in Denver. They knew nothing about gymnastics, dance or art. And they really made the effort to drive me and seek out these programs.”
Today, Montoya hopes to help parents, like his own, willing to do what it takes to encourage their child’s athletic talent. Montoya runs an after-school/summer recreational program called Moving People Dance Española. He has seen his program grow to 275 students this past Spring from 25 students when he started a year and a half ago.
El Rito resident Patty Shure said her son, 11-year old Victor Vialpando, is a natural athlete and has been with Montoya’s program since it began.
“He’s one of those kids that was riding a two-wheeler before he turned 3 years old,” Shure said. “We’re always looking for ways for him to grow in his athleticism.”
Since late-March and with Montoya’s help, Shure has been driving Vialpando two-hours to Albuquerque so that he could get training at Gold Cup Gymnastics. The training provided at Gold Cup has produced Olympic athletes like 2008 bronze medalist Joey Hagerty.
“We approached Roger about wanting Victor to keep growing and wanting him to feel good about himself,” Shure said about her and her roommate, Mary Shoemaker. “And Roger said to us, ‘I want to see him on more equipment than we have here. We only have mats (here in Española).’ So Roger, knew this place and called them and went down with us. He got Victor into an introductory class just to check it out. They immediately took one look at what Victor could do and said you need to be in an intermediate class.”
Shure said by the end of Vialpando’s first class, the trainers at the Albuquerque gym offered him a spot on one of their gymnastic teams.
“He had this natural, innate sense of flipping, and he’s very athletic,” Montoya said.
Since the trainers at Gold Cup were so impressed with Vialpando, Montoya told them he had other talented youths who were ready for further training. Montoya said the Gold Cup gym set up a special Saturday advanced course for his students who have already done tumbling.
Since May 23, nine of Montoya’s students have been going to Albuquerque to get gymnastic training that can’t be provided in Española because of the lack of equipment like balance beams, horses, rings, etc. Montoya said Gold Cup is also providing these classes at a reduced fee around of $120 to $150 for four weeks.
Montoya’s eight students have one more Saturday training session but Shure said she’ll keep driving her son as long as he’s interested in gymnastics. Vialpando, a sixth-grader at El Rito Elementary, gave two reasons for his interest in gymnastics.
“I like it because it gets me energized,” he said. “And I do it at school to impress girls sometimes, but then it got really old and they were (sarcastically) like, ‘Oh wow.’”
Despite what the girls think, Vialpando said he loves his sport and dreams of being in the Olympics. He said his biggest challenge is learning how to do side flips (imagine a cartwheel without the use of hands). He also gets inspiration from Junior Olympic athletes who train at the Gold Cup.
“There was this kid and he would do a double back flip twist into a front flip and land it perfect,” he said. “I was just amazed.”