CATCHING UP WITH…
Michelle Goodwin: Still living up to her name
INNOVATIVE and elegant, Michelle Goodwin earned respect and international honors dur- ing her short but successful career in the arly 1980s. Her routines combined spectacular skills with effortless grace, and three
decades later she understandably finds it hard to
define her unique style of gymnastics.
“I would like to think that there are several
things people would remember my gymnastics
for,” says Goodwin (now West), a coach, choreographer and special-needs teacher in Sarasota,
Fla. “Having your national team coaches and
teammates know that they can depend on you
to come through is vital to the team’s success,
and I feel that consistency was one of my
biggest contributions. In addition, I hope people
think my creativity with dance on floor and my
mount and combinations on bars, for that time
period, were very innovative. I am extremely
proud of my bars mount, a roundoff, piked Arabian. Although it never officially became ‘the
Goodwin’ in the Code of Points, I still hear former teammates or commentators refer to it as
such, and I am very proud of that.” (See
You Tube on p. 8.)
West credits Tom McCarthy,
her coach at Berks Gymnastics
Academy in Wyomissing, Pa.,
for her novel performances.
Her lovely, 1981 U.S. title-winning floor routine to “
Warsaw Concerto” and solid beam
work were notable for their
unique acrobatics as well as
their intricate dance, leap and
turning elements. West, who
competed at the ’81 world
championships in Moscow and
placed 12th all-around at the
’82 World Cup in Zagreb,
Yugoslavia, says contemporary coaches and
their gymnasts have a similar opportunity to distinguish themselves, despite the ever-changing
Code.
“Tom was able to find very innovative ways to
show off my strengths in creating my routines,”
Following her elite
career she competed for
Florida and then Indiana
University of Pennsylvania,
where she studied deaf
education. She taught deaf
Goodwinatthe 1981Moscowworld championships, andaboveonthe April1982IGcover
and hard-of-hearing students
in elementary and middle
school for 11 years, and has
spent the last three years
teaching reading and language
arts to middle-school students
with varying exceptionalities
and special needs. West and
her husband, Lance, a dentist
whom she met when both
were sophomores at Florida,
will celebrate their 21st
anniversary in July. Their
daughters, 13-year-old Savan-
nah and 10-year-old Alexan-
dra, are gymnasts.
“Several experiences stand out for me that
have had a lasting impact on my life,” says
West, whom this writer interviewed for IG in
1981. Fondest are the ’81 worlds—“they gave
me the initial taste of the amazing opportunities
that could lie ahead”—and the ’82 Hungarian
International in Budapest.
In Budapest, she pulled up from 16th place
all-around after compulsories (where she fell
twice on beam, her best event) to finish fourth,
and went on to win bars and floor in the event
finals. She continues to benefit from the lesson
she learned there, one which can inspire the
gymnasts she coaches and the students she
teaches.
“Standing on the podium and hearing the
national anthem played were moments I will
never forget,” West says. “It taught me a lot
about never giving up, and fighting through
seemingly impossible odds to succeed.”
—John Crumlish
