By Tom Rohrer
These days, family game night at the Apelar house focuses on one activity. Instead of board games, craft projects or kicking the soccer ball around the back yard, the family stacks cups.
Rebecca, now twelve, was introduced to the sport during her fourth grade year at Mountain View Elementary in 2012. The Apelar’s have since become one of Thurston County’s premier sport stacking families.
Rebecca and her younger sisters Autumn, 10, and Isabella, 5, all will be traveling to Des Moines, Iowa for the U.S. Junior Olympics to compete in the sport stacking championships. The competition will run from Friday, August 1, to Saturday, August 2.
The Apelar sisters qualified for the national championships through their performance at the Northwest Regional Sport Stacking Tournament in Auburn on March 8. In order to qualify for the AAU Junior Olympics, the sisters needed to finish in the top of their age group at the regional tournament.
Competing for the “Need for Speed” team from Mountain View Elementary, the girls put forth a top flight performance worthy of a chance to compete against the nation’s best.
“I’m excited just to compete and meet new people and test myself,” said Rebecca, who just finished her sixth grade year at Komachin Middle School. “It will be a lot of fun.”
”I’m looking forward to the challenge and meeting new people,” said Autumn. “Oh, and the airplane and the airport.”
A so called “niche sport,” sport stacking contestants must place a series of cups on top of each other as quickly as possible. Pyramid-like formations, using official stacking cups must be created, while the time it takes to complete the stack decides the final ranking among participants.
The sport immediately appealed to Rebecca when she was introduced to it in her fourth grade P.E. class. A year later, she joined an after-school club focusing on stacking. A pianist, cellist, basketball and soccer player, the oldest child of Amy and Tom Apelar will be testing for her black belt in Shotokan karate in September. Autumn has similar versatility, as she plays the flute, recorder and piano while competing in karate and soccer.
The coordination and focus the girls picked up from stacking seems to have benefitted their other areas of interest.
“My hand eye coordination is much better,” said Rebecca. “I started getting better from the speed training and I’m much faster now in everything.”
Unfamiliar with stacking before Rebecca’s initial interest, Amy Apelar notices positive impacts the sport has on her children as well.
“I would say that there’s more of a sense of pride with the girls,” Amy noted. “As times start to decrease and they advance, they become more confident. Then you see that self-confidence get boosted.”
Also appealing is stacking’s inexpensive equipment. Unlike many traditional sports, the list of equipment required for stacking is short and cheap.
The only necessities are cups and a mat. The simplicity of the equipment matches up well with its complexity and skill according to Amy.
“It’s simple. You can just throw the mat and cups on the table. But (stacking) is a discipline too,” Amy said. “They have to practice to succeed and it teaches them to find something they like, work at it and stick with it. Plus practice doesn’t cost money, so you have to factor that in as well.”
All three sisters, and even their three-year-old younger brother have adhered to their required practice time. Both Isabella and Autumn noted they practice at least one hour a day. Such diligence in honing their craft has led to the Apelar’s favorite thing: breaking records.
“All I want to do is break records,” said Autumn. “That’s the fun part.”
“We practice an hour at least, no matter what,” Rebecca reported. “Since my youngest sister started, it’s fun to see how much she’s improved. I always hear her running down the hall screaming about her new record. That’s so fun.”
“I feel proud,” added Isabella about her constant improvement.
All six members of the family will make the trek to Iowa for the weekend, along with Amy’s mom and dad. Throughout the weekend, the three sisters will meet new competitors, who likely will become new friends.
“That’s the fun part,” Rebecca commented. “Last year, I met three girls from Colorado who I’m friends with. There are so many people there, all with the same interest.”
Though bonds will be formed with unfamiliar competitors, the Apelar’s already have extensive experience with one another, and have further cemented their sisterhood.
“It’s something they can all do together. They can compete with each other, but in a way where it’s fun for all of them,” said Amy. “They’re already close, but they get closer through stacking.”
Thanks to her daughter’s extreme interest in the sport, Amy has picked up stacking skills as well. These skills led her to an unexpected victory in the adult division at the same competition where her daughters qualified for the Junior Olympics.
“At the competition, my mom competed just for fun since we would be there all day,” said Autumn. “She made it to finals, and got first place in the cycle.”
“I should note that I was one of only three competitors in the division,” said Amy with a smile. “But I have had a lot of practice.”
Watch the Apelar sister stack during a fundraiser at the Lacey Limeberry. The event is scheduled for July 21 from 5:00 – 9:00 pm. More information can be found here.
For more information on sport stacking and the Junior Olympics visit http://www.thewssa.com/competitive_stacks/.
