When Clara Raposo first signed up for recreational gymnastics classes, she had no ambition of becoming a gymnast. She was seven years old and decided to take lessons because her friends were involved in the sport.
Her coaches, though, realized in no time that Raposo had a natural talent. After only two weeks, they tested her for a competitive program and soon afterward Raposo joined her first competitive group.
What followed looked like the beginning of a fairytale. One year after her first gymnastics class, Raposo was one of only four gymnasts to be selected to train under coach Lisa Cowan, who continues to be one of her coaches, at East York Gymnastics in Ontario, Canada. At 9, Raposo began her elite journey, moving quickly through the Aspire program (the Canadian equivalent of the United State’s TOPs), the Novice program (similar to the United State’s HOPES), and the junior and senior levels. In 2019, she represented Canada internationally for the first time at International Gymnix, and that fall she competed at the junior world championships. The future looked bright, and that winter Raposo started working on upgrades for the following season.
In 2020, however, Raposo suffered the first of a series of serious knee injuries that haunted her for the next…
