MINNESOTA MEN’S GYMNASTICS FINISHES SEASON WITH OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCES AT THE MIGS PROGRAM INVITATIONAL AND A FIRST PLACE FINISH AT THE NIU INVITATIONAL
The final home meet of the season was the 2026 MIGS Program Invitational, hosted by Minnesota Men’s Gymnastics assistant coach Bob Wuornos. Humboldt High School once again hosted the final home meet before the Gophers headed to the NIU Invitational.
The Men’s Intercollegiate Gymnastics Program (MIGSP) was founded by Bob Wuornos in 2002 with the goal to assure there are collegiate gymnastics opportunities for high school gymnasts who would like to compete at the college level. With the advent of the GymACT Programs coming into existence, the number of opportunities has risen tremendously, and Bob’s efforts have helped many GymACT and NCAA Programs alike.
Since we had no other GymACT Team in attendance, this was a glorified intrasquad meet that gave us a chance to get to see a few more routines from guys than in a traditional competition.
Warren Strootman competed for the first time all season in the All Around and posted a solid score of 72.00 which included the high score on Parallel Bars of 13.20. Other events winners included Anthony Nicholas winning Floor Exercise with a 13.20; Jack Gagamov took top honors on Pommel Horse with a 12.70 in his first routine of the year on this event; Owen Frank continued his winning ways on Still Rings with his 6th event title of the season and his 5th meet in a row where he posted a 13.0+ score; Caleb Gurman took the Vault title with a 13.90; and Justin Lancisi took top honors on High Bar with his season high score of 12.55.
MINNESOTA GymACT TEAM 1 TAKES TOP HONORS AT THE 2026 NORTHERN ILLINOIS INVITATIONAL
The DuPage County Fairgrounds in Lombard, IL was home to the annual NIU Invitational. Five GymACT Teams competed alongside local club teams in a high energy event, which was the final regular season competition for Minnesota Men’s Gymnastics this year.
The final results looked like this:
1. MN GymACT Team 1 306.70
2. Iowa GymACT 287.80
3. NIU Team 1 286.50
4. New York Alliance 270.30
5. Kansas City 265.10
The Event Champions were as follows:
Floor Exercise – Ben Letvin, Minnesota 13.50
Pommel Horse – Jerid Enyard, NIU 12.80
Still Rings – Owen Frank, Minnesota 13.50
Vault – Peter Davis-Ross, Minnesota 14.40
Parallel Bars – Luke Pedersen, Minnesota 13.20
High Bar – Jack Gagamov & Luke Pedersen, Minnesota 13.60
All Around – Ben Letvin, Minnesota 75.20
What a great showing for the Maroon & Gold, as they walked away with 6 of the 7 Event Titles. This was a great end to the regular season for Minnesota, as they finished the regular season with an amazing 16-1 record for the 2026 campaign. This season brought the win-loss record for the Minnesota Men’s Gymnastics Team for the past 3 seasons to an amazing 47-1 record, equating to a 0.979 winning percentage in the GymACT League! The team was once again dominant during the regular season, and we’ll be bringing that confidence into the post season as we prepare for the Eastern Conference Championships and the grand finale – GymACT National Championships.
MINNESOTA BRINGS 10 GYMNASTS TO THE 2026 EAST VS. WEST ALL STAR MEET IN BIRMINGHAM, ALABAMA
The 5th Annual GymACT All Star Meet took place at the Birmingham-Jefferson Convention Center on Friday, April 10th, in beautiful Birmingham, Alabama. This contest was held in conjunction with the NAIGC National Championships, which hosts over 1,700 college gymnasts every year. The energy in the building was electric as the Eastern Conference brought their best athletes to battle the Western Conference. Since the beginning of the East-West All Star Meet in 2022, the West has been victorious in these past 4 All Star Meets. But this year was different!
This year, the East turned the tide and posted a resounding victory over the West by a score of 307.50 to 302.35! Congratulations to all the athletes who participated in the 2026 GymACT East-West All Star Meet, and let’s hope this is a trend-setting moment in GymACT history!
Minnesota gymnasts performed 23 routines out of the 30 routines for Team East, and here are the top 3 results for Minnesota on the 6 events:
Floor Exercise: Anthony Nicholas, 2nd place (13.40); Micah Winder, 3rd place tie (13.30)
Pommel Horse: Ben Letvin, 2nd place tie (12.50)
Still Rings: Ben Letvin, 3rd place (12.80)
Vault: Ben Letvin & Peter Davis-Ross, 1st place tie (13.90)
Parallel Bars: Luke Pedersen, 2nd place (12.85)
High Bar: Jack Gagamov, 1st place (13.40); Luke Pedersen, 2nd place (13.10)
All-Around: Ben Letvin, 77.10
While there was no All-Around competition, Ben was the only gymnast to qualify on all 6 events, and he posted his highest All-Around score of the season in the GymACT League. Congratulations to the East Team and all the Minnesota gymnasts who were part of this historic victory.
MINNESOTA HEADS TO EASTERN CONFERENCE CHAMPIONSHIPS ON APRIL 25TH
Minnesota will be traveling to West Palm Beach, FL to compete in the GymACT Eastern Conference Championships alongside the USAG JD Eastern Championships (https://usagym.org/events/2026-mens-eastern-national-championships/).
Minnesota will be battling the other conference teams in an effort to capture our 5th straight conference title, an unprecedented feat for a program that joined GymACT in 2022. “I’m excited about this team this year. In spite of some injuries to some key players, we have been able to stay dominant not only within the Eastern Conference, but nationally too” stated head coach Mike Burns. “These guys have worked hard all year and since coming back from Spring Break in late March, we have performed over 500 routines in preparation for our post-season run.”
This team is serious about what it’s going to take to shine in the Championship portion of the season. They showed up at the All Star Meet and we are anticipating more bright moments at the Eastern and National Championships!
The Eastern Conference Championships can be viewed live on the GymACT YouTube channel. The competition will get underway at 5:00 pm EST on Saturday, April 25th. The live stream can be viewed here on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAqcyuKQmJ0
Live scoring can also be found on the new score publishing app called ScoreCat.
IMPRESSIVE ARTICLE ON GymACT FROM INSIDE GYMNASTICS
A great article was written by Sarahy Mora and recently released on the Inside Gymnastics magazine Instagram page. Here’s a link to the article:
Enjoy. It’s a great read!!!
FOUNDATION GYMNASTICS CONTINUES INCREASING ENROLLMENT
Our Preschool and Rec Programs are slowly but surely seeing more and more kids in the local vicinity signing up for classes. It’s been gaining some traction and all the kids who are currently enrolled are having a great time in class and learning the basics of gymnastics from members of the team who are part of the coaching staff. Thanks to all who are making Foundation Gymnastics a destination for kids in St. Paul. Information on our program can be found on the Foundation Gymnastics website: www.foundationgym.org.
STICK THE DISMOUNT FUNDRAISER
The annual Stick the Dismount campaign was launched last month. This campaign has gone on for almost 20 years, bringing in thousands of dollars for the Minnesota Men’s Gymnastics Program.
The way it works is participants can pledge a dollar amount per Stuck Dismount through the year. Last year we had a total of 103 stuck dismounts so that’s a number you can use to gauge your potential pledge. So, if you pledged $2 per stick and we stick 103 dismounts again, you’d be donating $206 at the end of the season.
Here’s a link to the STUCK DISMOUNT PLEDGE GOOGLE FORM:
https://STICK THE DISMOUNT CAMPAIGN
You can cap your pledge or make a one-time donation on behalf of the Stick The Dismount campaign. This is a great way to follow the team throughout the season and provide support based on their level of success.
We had 18 Stuck Dismounts at the MN GymACT Invitational so we’re on the move and we saw a nice increase in the number of sticks in that meet. Hopefully the team will continue to fight for those landings and continue to bring in funding for the program. As of this writing, the team has stuck 57 dismounts.
Donations to the program are always greatly appreciated and can be made through our website: www.minnesotagymnastics.org.
