Olympic gymnast Ellie Black made a return visit to Sarnia Friday, taking part in a golf fundraiser at Sawmill Creek.
The Nova Scotia native says the Rio Olympics were something she'll always remember.
"To be at my second Olympic games with our team was just incredible," says Black. "Olympics are a different level to any other competition, to be out there with the best in the world competing and representing Canada."
She says training in Sarnia is a great experience and very helpful in advance of competition.
"We've had a couple camps here, and they've been probably the greatest thing for us as a team," says Black. "It's such an amazing place to be at Bluewater Gymnastics. John Vargo has been helping us out with treatment and working at the clinic and using everything we needed. Definitely going down to the Olympics and having him around gave us a familiar face and anything we needed we were able to get."
Black says she's proud of Corunna native Derek Drouin's gold medal high jump win.
"We went to his highjump final and that was incredible, it was awesome. We were so excited to see him there, and for him to win gold was amazing," she says.
Black finished fifth in the women's individual all-around competition in Rio. The Canadian team failed to qualify for the team finals.
Her career highlights include three gold medals at the 2015 Pan AM Games in Toronto.
She also earned first place finishes in the balance beam competition at the 2014 Commonwealth Games, and vault competition at the 2014 Pacific Rim Championships.
Black says she plans to resume her Kinesiology studies at Dalhousie University in Halifax and, after taking some time off, prepare to make the team for next year's world championships to be held in Montreal.
- With Files From Lee Michaels
