Sherry Peng

When we trip and fall, we think of ourselves as the main character in everyone’s lives. But when we think about believing in or helping others, we think we have little to no meaningful impact. Throughout life, we often see ourselves as insignificant when it matters and significant when it doesn’t. It takes a LOT of evidence for us to realize the weight we hold in others’ lives. Here’s two times where I got an opportunity to step up in life, all because a single individual believed in me.

Two years ago, I was 17, working as a recreational gymnastics coach at a local gym. I have always wanted to coach, as I wanted to be the coach I never had. I wanted to be someone who embraced failure and kids’ ambitions and dreams. This was my first job in the gymnastics field, and I didn’t have connections to coach competitively. After a year, I still enjoyed teaching kids gymnastics, but the gym was holding me back. As I sat in the break room one day, a bubbly woman started making small talk with us. I asked her what she was doing at the gym, and she was choreographing routines for all the team girls. Then, she randomly asked me about my interest in judging, and I responded, “I know nothing, but that sounds so cool.” Dona followed up with, “I’m the state judging director. If you want to judge, I can help get you started.”

A month later, I got fired for no explicit reason (story for another time..). I kept thinking about how they gave me no chance to tell my gymnasts’ parents about my departure. Luckily, I went to a local gymnastics meet the following week to meet a couple other judges at a meet in Livermore, CA. I studied all the rules in the handbook, drove to Fresno the following week, and passed the USA Gymnastics Level 8 judging exam. I started judging girls’ optionals (Level 6-8) in spring of 2024. Judging made me excited about gymnastics in a way I wasn’t before; seeing girls go from excited to frustrated to nervous and being in the front-row seat of competitive gymnastics made me realize how much I wanted to be the person guiding them through their journey to success, not just scoring them.

During my second meet, I was extremely nervous, as I got paired with a Brevet-rated judge, the highest rated level only achieved with previous international elite or Olympic experience. She was an elite gymnast in Romania, a member of the national team, and 1 of 2 Brevet-rated judges out of about 100 judges in NorCal. I was intimidated, and still felt overwhelmed with the entire code. Wow, was I wrong. She talked sternly and almost never smiled, but she was kind to me; she reassured me that I could ask her questions on specific deductions and didn’t scrutinize me over my inexperience. In fact, she started a conversation with me on my goals in judging and/or coaching. I told her I really wanted to coach competitively, but I had no experience other than teaching recreational classes.

After the meet finished, as I got my stuff and started heading out of the gym, Rodica called my name from across the floor. She was with two coaches I saw during the meet, so part of me was nervous I had done something wrong. Rodica introduced me as a new judge to them, the owners of Apex Gymnastics in San Jose, Olga and Tatiana. She told them that I was passionate and really interested in coaching team. They asked me what levels and events I was interested in coaching, and I quickly said Xcel Bronze/Silver and beam/floor.

Rodica asked, “Do you want to come work for them?”

I was shocked, “Yes, definitely.”

I was stunned. Not only did she go out of her way to talk to and ask the meet’s best performing team’s coaches and owners to take a chance on me to coach their team, she believed in me. She believed in me, when I didn’t even believe in myself. She could have simply and rightfully done nothing and went home for the day. Yet, she trusted an 18-year old new judge she met the same day to successfully coach a competitive team. She saw my passion and ambition and carved out a path for me to walk down, despite the unknowns.

Just a little over a year later, I have judged thousands of routines through USA Gymnastics and National Gymnastics Association on all four events, bars, beam, floor, and vault. I was the youngest state-rated judge in northern California at 18 and have recently tested up to the regional rating. I’ve met countless judges who stemmed from prestigious gym owners to D1 gymnasts to elite-level coaches to top NCAA officials (Random, but a gym owner/NCAA official even invited me to sit on the floor and line judge at a Cal meet!). They’ve treated me as an equal and have guided me throughout many meets all over the state. I’ve been invited to judge the NGA (National Gymnastics Association) State Championships, USA Gymnastics meets in Livermore, Napa, Rohnert Park, San Francisco, San Luis Obispo, Santa Clara, and Watsonville. CIF high school meets in Los Altos, as well as in-house meets from gyms in Concord, Emeryville, Fremont, and San Jose. I even got assigned to judge a meet at the same gym that fired me (You can guess that it was a great day).

Best of all, I have been given an incredible opportunity to be a team coach. I have coached a team of 14 gymnasts, specializing in beam and floor. I have also been able to work with higher-level gymnasts on all four events. Having this privilege to prepare them for the season, I emphasized rigor, hard work, humility, kindness, and ambition. I drilled them on staying focused and maintaining excellence under incredible pressure at meets. I asked one of my gymnasts a couple months ago, “Do you want to do gymnastics in college?” She said, “Yes! I want to go to UCLA and do gymnastics there!” I told her that if she worked hard and never let anyone tell her she was too late or not talented enough, she could achieve this. This same 9-year old gymnast, who never competed prior, ended up placing 17th out of 289 at USA Gymnastics state championships, 1st in beam, and 2nd all-around in her age group. Several other girls on the team consistently pushed 9.9 and 9.95 on beam. Our team as a whole consistently placed first at meets; across 23 gyms at states, they placed 3rd all-around and 1st in beam.

Coaching has not only given me the privilege to watch kids fail, improve, and grow, but it has opened my eyes to what humanity is inherently about. Humans are born curious and talkative, with an infinite number of questions I have the privilege to answer. Due to intense physics/math course load and transfer applications, I made the difficult decision to leave Apex as soon as training for the season ended. Still, I think frequently about my time there, what I told them when they were down, the progression of their confidence, and the dreams they shared with me.

I would have never gotten to coach a competitive team or judge gymnastics without Dona and Rodica taking a chance on me. They didn’t have an incentive to help me or get me in the door. These two movie-like encounters continue to remind me that one individual has the power to alter the course of someone’s life. This isn’t a story about me or gymnastics. It’s a story about the power of two people who believed in a stranger, just because. Regardless of your “status” or what you have, you have an influence on everyone around you. Sometimes, one person simply saying “I believe in you” or “Don’t give up, I know you can do it” can light a spark in you. These two moments, along with many others not shared here, remind me that believing in someone isn’t just kind, it’s transformative.