Danusia Francis –Episode 17

Danusia Francis is an Artistic Gymnast who is half Jamaican, half Polish, and born in the UK. Danusia left home at a young age to pursue her lifelong dream: to compete at the Olympics. While Danusia made the switch to a career in TV at the age of 22, her determination and love of gymnastics brought her back to competing professionally. Not only has she proven that her dream was still achievable but Danusia’s entertaining, powerful, and undeniable gymnastic talent will take her to the floor at the 2020 Olympic Games taking place in Tokyo next year.

Danusia formerly competed for Great Britain where she represented the country as a reserve athlete at the 2012 Summer Olympic before making the switch to competing under the Jamaican flag. Danusia’s motivation for switching to Team Jamaica is to support the Jamaica Olympic Association’s ambition to grow the sport in a country famed for world-renowned track stars. She attended UCLA and competed for the UCLA Bruins gymnastics team where she become a six-time All-American and winning multiple national competitions along the way.

Having enjoyed an illustrious junior and senior career, Danusia has amassed the following achievements:

• 2019 World Championships: Tokyo Olympics Qualifier

• 2019 Pan American Games: AA & Balance beam finalist (Jamaica's first ever gymnastics finalist)

• 2018 World Championships

• 2016 NCAA Balance Beam Co-Champion: Scored two perfect 10s on beam (3/6/16 and 3/16/14)

• 2015 World Championships: qualifying Jamaica's first ever spot at the Olympic Test Event

• 2014 became the first gymnast to do a sideways side aerial to a layout full dismount 

• 2013 World University Games: Floor finalist

• 2012 European Championships: Team 4th

• 2011 World Championships: helping to secure a team spot in the 2012 Olympics for Great Britain

• 2011 European Championships: AA finalist

• 2010, 2011 British Championships: Balance Beam champion

In this episode of In Her Corner, we talk to Danusia about the role that national governing bodies have on athletes’ career prospects and welfare, the gender pay gap between male and female athletes and Danusia’s ambitions to win gold at the Tokyo Olympic Games.

You can listen to the trailer for Danusia’s episode using the player below:

Danusia’s full episode will be released at 1pm BST on Wednesday 28 October and will be available to listen to on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and other major streaming platforms.

Podcast theme track by Wayne Urquhart  and Mix Engineering by Nick Murphy.