Team Feature: Peru with Mauricio Gallegos

Peru will head to Toronto wearing an iconic Peruvian sash design. British designer, Angelo Trofa, worked on the design whilst traveling in South America, absorbing local influences and iconography to create a design that is meaningful and truly representative of the nation. The red sash was first adopted by Peru's soccer team in 1936 and has become somewhat of a national symbol ever since. Trofa took the design beyond classic with a stylish twist, wrapping it around the torso and adding a beautiful contrasting Peruvian inspired design within it. The Peruvian Olympic Committee's logo sits atop of the heart and Peruvian text banner on the back neck completes the design.

Peru is a developing nation in gymnastics terms, and have some extremely talented young gymnasts that with the right support will undoubtedly bring their country up several rungs of the gymnastics ladder. We caught up with one of the gymnasts participating in Toronto, Mauricio Gallegos:

Top 3 Results:

• 2007 & 2008 3rd Place Rings Final (Junior South American Championships)
• 2009 3rd Place Team Final (Bolivarian Games)
• 2014 3rd Place AA Final (South American Championships)

Turn: What are the goals for the Pan-Am Games, both as a team and as an individual?

MG: There will only be two gymnasts competing for Peru in Toronto. My goal is to make the All-Around final, and also apparatus finals on High Bar, Pommel Horse and with extra effort, potentially rings also.

Turn: How are preparations going?

MG: Preparations are generally consisting of some clean up work and stabilizing my routines in order to score greater than 80 points in the All-Around, whilst also looking at adding a couple of new skills to elevate my difficulty. Our final competition in preparation for Toronto will be the South American Championships from 16-22 June in Cali, Colombia.

Turn: Once your competition in Toronto is over, are you looking forward to watching any of the other 35 sports?

MG: I think it would be judo and swimming, it would be great to watch and support my compatriots.

Turn: If the FIG and your government gave you $2,000,000 to improve the level of gymnastics in your country, how would you spend it?

MG: In my opinion, the money would be best used to improve the infrastructure of gymnastics already in place and continue with the vision to implement a team in most colleges and universities. This way there would be greater knowledge of and greater attraction to gymnastics in our country. On top of this, increase the support of individual athletes because I believe that they are the ultimate testimony of how great this sport is.