Williamsburg Gymnast Commits to Fairmont State for Acrobatics and Tumbling

WILLIAMSBURG — Jazmyn Johnson, a Williamsburg resident and gymnast, will continue her academic and gymnastics career at Fairmont State University.

Johnson began competing in gymnastics at an early age, and knew she wanted to earn a scholarship to compete in college. She also knew that for a chance at a scholarship, her skills would have to wow the judges.

“When I would see other people at different gyms get higher scores than I would, it would motivate me, because I knew I could get those scores too, but only if I worked hard,” Johnson said.

After switching gyms, Johnson began training at World Class Gymnastics in Newport News.

“When I first got to World Class, I was training level seven, and I got moved up very quickly to level eight. I did one year of level eight and did very well and got very high scores. Me and a couple of my other teammates were on the Virginia state team that year. That’s basically when they chose a group of level eight gymnasts at states to represent your home state,” Johnson said.

While training for level nine, Johnson faced a few setbacks with injuries. Due to a torn ligament in her foot, Johnson had to take time off training.

“It really wasn’t my best year because I didn’t get my skills as quickly as everybody else did because of my injury. My coaches were training me for level ten after that season. I did one competition and I really wasn’t very confident during the one competition. I didn’t have as many skills as I wanted to and I’d never really been in that position before,” Johnson said.

As a senior at Lafayette High School, Johnson began looking at colleges as the recruitment process began. When she stepped foot on the Fairmont State University campus, she said it felt like home.

“My call with Fairmont felt very different. I knew that I wanted to visit and see how the experience was. When I went to visit, it was something I wasn’t expecting. It wasn’t too big, it wasn’t too small. It was 100% something that I wanted to do. It just felt like home when I was there,” Johnson said.

Johnson signed on to Fairmont State to compete for the school’s acrobatics and tumbling team. She says that acrobatics and tumbling is a mix of cheerleading and gymnastics.

“Acro is kind of like cheerleading. They do stunting, they do a whole bunch of tumbling, and I think they even have, like, a little dance section. It’s very, very different from gymnastics with the cheerleading aspects included,” Johnson said.

As she prepares to head to Fairmont State in the fall, Johnson wants to leave behind a piece of advice for future gymnasts.

“Trust the process. There will be days where you aren’t 100% sure that you want to do gymnastics anymore. You will go through those moments of stress in life. Believe in yourself and show up for yourself,” Johnson said.

The 2026 Fairmont State Acrobatics and Tumbling season will kick off in February.