KAILEY KALTENBRUN poses in Washington D.C., Niagara Falls and the Black Hills.– Submitted photos 

The last time Kailey Kaltenbrun took a gymnastics-pose picture was in Florida during her freshman year at North. The senior might do it again this spring.

“I feel a graduation one would be really cool with a cap and gown,” she said.

Kaltenbrun says she has taken hundreds of pictures of her doing several poses of the sport she loves, and she thinks it began on a trip to Yellowstone National Park in sixth grade.

“I feel like I was influenced by social media at that point because I was looking through gymnastics photos, so I kind of wanted to do that too,” Kaltenbrun said. 

“And I knew my friends were doing it as well too, so I just jumped on with it.”

In addition to taking some shots at Mount Rushmore that trip, Kaltenbrun has struck a pose near Niagara Falls.

“Which is harder to do because there’s a lot more people,” she said. “Sometimes I’d get weird looks, but I’d ignored it and do my thing.”

Kaltenbrun also used her eighth-grade trip to Washington D.C. as a chance to add to her collection she eventually posts on Instagram.

“Everyone was taking a break and I was out there in the sun jumping,” she said.

Kaltenrbrun started gymnastics when she was 1 at the toddler and parent classes at the YMCA.

One of her first memories came when she was 5 or 6 because she would cry under the beam.

“Attachment to my parents I think,” she said. “When they left when I was younger, I would just cry.”

Kaltenbrun, who plans on studying environmental engineering at Wisconsin or Minnesota, competed in her final conference championship meet over the weekend.

She says she will miss the dancing a lot, as well as the jumps and leaps.

“That was my favorite part to compete in and to show off those skills,” Kaltenbrun said. “As well as the friends I have made along the way. I made friends with people I probably would have never talked to if I wasn’t in the sport.”