Humboldt’s own Brianne Theisen-Eaton and her husband Ashton Eaton were in town to spread their message of reaching goals and taking opportunities at the Calico Gymnastics Gala on Sept. 18.
“It went absolutely amazing. The generosity of people tonight has just been incredible and we’re just ecstatic,” said Val Graf, one of the co-chairs for the event.
The whole event was meant to raise money for a new building for Calico. Graf said they’re hoping to have enough for a down payment on a building by next year. Safety is the most important issue for the new building. There are steel beams in the current building they’d rather not have, and they want to have foam pits for the kids to fall into.
The gala idea came out of a Calico Gymnastics board meeting.
“We were just sitting around as a board, trying to think of what we could do that would really interest a lot of people, and we thought, Brianne and Ashton are celebrities from our hometown. They always promote health and fitness in kids, and that’s kind of what we’re trying to promote with our gymnastics club, and we just thought it would be a perfect fit,” Graf said.
Other co-chair Jodi Smith contacted Theisen-Eaton about it, and she immediately accepted.
“Of course I said yeah, just because of all the support I had gotten growing up here,” Theisen-Eaton said.
Eaton and Theisen-Eaton talked about the support they’ve always had and the importance of taking opportunities that were presented to them.
“Ash and I have taken every opportunity we’ve ever had to further our goals,” Theisen-Eaton said in her speech.
They didn’t just focus on what worked for them – both talked about times they thought they failed. For Eaton, a failure for him in 2011 was particularly difficult because it felt for him like all the work he put in and everything leading up to it was for nothing. For Theisen-Eaton, her failure was a silver medal when she felt like she could have gotten a gold. But while they felt bad about not doing as well as they could, they said that the failures were just an opportunity and a catalyst to do better and not make the same mistakes.
“If I can say I competed to the best of my ability (later) … I think I can look at the silver medal and not be disappointed,” Theisen-Eaton said.
She said the main thing she wanted people to take away from her talk was the importance of taking opportunities.
In addition to the gala, Theisen-Eaton and Eaton spoke at a student rally that had 1,200 kids from around the region. Sept. 19 saw kids aged five and older get to try out the gymnastics equipment and spend some time with the two Olympians.
“I think when I was younger and just getting to meet athletes in person was really cool, so being able to give back that way (is nice),” Theisen-Eaton said.
Though the gala was for parents, it’s the kids who were meant to be the main recipients of the message.
“I think the main thing is that Brianne came from Humboldt, and she worked really hard to achieve her goals and I think it just shows them that they can work hard too and get what they want from life,” Graf said.
