Seven-year-old Declan Burt springs for gold.

RUIMSIG – Declan Burt (7) is soaring for the skies – literally – as a gymnastics enthusiast and competitor who achieved gold at the North Zone Festival on 6 September.
Burt showed an interest in gymnastics from a very young age. 
“He used to do cartwheels everywhere we went, at the grocery store, and he would sometimes do them with one hand,” said his mother Candy Burt.
The Grade 2 pupil at Maragon Private Schools achieved his Central West Gauteng junior colours in a series of friendly competitions before he went on to represent Central Gauteng at the North Zone Festival.
Although he emerged triumphant at the festival, Declan seems quite unfazed by his recent accomplishment and reckons his first regional competition in Centurion for the Gauteng Colours is the one that stands out.
“I like the bar and my floor and my P-bar – that is what I am currently doing. I have just started level two and it’s hard. You have to do a forward roll and you get up and you have to do a hard turn and then a backwards roll. 
Like any seven-year-old boy, Declan loves playing outside and on the trampoline – tricks that have certainly paid off on the mat. 
His mother added that gymnastics is great exercise for the competitor and the strict rules during rehearsals and competitions create good discipline.
He added, “I practice twice a week for two hours but it is usually more when I have a competition coming up. My coach is very strict with us and does not let us slack off.”
Apart from gymnastics, Declan is quite the sportsman as a football, rugby and hockey player “I also do judo but I am going to quit that soon, I am not playing hockey anymore because someone stole my hockey stick.”
Burt is excited about his future competitions and adding more medals and trophies in the cabinet. He chirps that he enjoys doing gymnastics and hopes to compete overseas in the very near future.
“He has told us before that he will give any sport and just do gymnastics if he has to,” informed Candy.
His focus may be on gymnastics but Declan always has the support of his parents to ensure that academic work does not take the back seat to his sporting activities, but he is quick to add that numeracy is not his cup of tea and that he prefers life skills.