Jan. 29, 2015
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -
By Anita Nham, GoPSUsports.com Student Staff Writer
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. - While other college students attended classes, completed plentiful amounts of homework, and participated in various extracurricular activities, junior Alexis Torres and redshirt senior Néstor RodrÃÂguez competed internationally for Puerto Rico this past fall semester.
"They had a great opportunity to represent their country at the world championship level," said head coach Randy Jepson.
Torres is from Catano, Puerto Rico and RodrÃÂguez is from Guaynabo, Puerto Rico. RodrÃÂguez was part of the Puerto Rican National Team Gymnasium club team before he started to compete for Penn State. When the opportunity came for the two of them to represent their country, by no means could they turn down the chance.
"We were born and raised in Puerto Rico, so we're part of the team there," said RodrÃÂguez. "Puerto Rico is a small country and they don't have many gymnasts compared to the United States or other countries, so we got to do our job to represent Puerto Rico. We got the opportunity, we're good enough, we made the team, and any athletes at this level is going to say, `Yes.' This is a dream for everyone, as an athlete especially."
Competing for Puerto Rico against other countries in the world was vastly different than competing at the collegiate level.
"It was a great experience," said Torres. "We were mostly practicing whenever. We only competed once and that's it. It's just like a completion, but it's really different than competing here in the college competitions. It was a definitely a change practicing and trying to train for those competitions and then coming here and trying to practice and train for all the competitions because, here, we compete more consecutively and for those competitions, it's like one day, that's it, and then, we don't compete for months or weeks."
Even though the competitions were different, Torres and RodrÃÂguez still bring a special element to the men's gymnastics team.
"We have the experience on top of every one [on the team]," said RodrÃÂguez. "We've already seen people that went to the World Championship - these are world-class athletes in comparison to college athletes, so obviously, we have that experience on top of them, which is helpful for the team."
Coach Jepson adds that Torres and RodrÃÂguez are great components to the team.
"They're really good," said coach Jepson. "They're just solid guys. They're very clean gymnasts in good difficulty and they're just really big pluses for us. It's great to see Néstor. He's had a career that's been kind of marked by injuries, and we just want to make sure that he's healthy this year and goes out with a strong finish. He's a former All-American and is a wonderful guy to have around as is Alexis. He's a light-hearted and a very talented kid. They bring a lot to the table for us."
With only three meets into the season, it is evident that Torres is making an impact on the team. He was named the Big Ten Co-Gymnast of the Week last week after the West Point Open. Torres has earned four individual titles, two in still rings, one in vault, and one in pummel horse, as well as a Big Ten Honor.
"I just competed," said Torres. "I didn't really win anything or a title. It was just something I saw in the paper, but it definitely motivated me. It made me see for myself that I was doing a good job and in that way, it motivated me to keep going and keep doing a good job."
Unfortunately, though RodrÃÂguez was in Puerto Rico, he was unable to compete due to injury.
"I didn't compete personally," said RodrÃÂguez. "I was recovering from a torn Achilles', but either way, it was a great experience for me just to go watch the team and especially other teams compete and see how they get prepared."
RodrÃÂguez is currently a senior and could have graduated last year, but by competing internationally, he was given the ability to compete in one final season for Penn State.
"[It] worked out great for Nestor, too, because he was coming back from injury," said coach Jepson. "He could have graduated [last year], but this way, he gets the collegiate season now and he gets to help our team and it was a great situation, a great fit for us. We're really please that they had the chance to get those experiences."