Cardinal Gymnastics Center

2015 was good but they overbooked for 2016 and now out of 1 hour of paid gymnastics time about 35 minutes was standing around doing LITERALLY nothing for my boy in the 3 – 5 year old class since apparently their team and older classes are taking up all the space.
The owner called me back the following week and apologized. She also confirmed that they were overbooked and the class was supposed to defer to the little guys and did not. Updating to 3 stars because that was nice. Would have been 5 if they offered an extra free week.

I have my daughter and son in summer camp and I gotta say, it’s no joke. The kids are doing a lot of work and having a blast. Pick them up every day and they are sweaty messes hahahaha. I asked my 4 year old the other day if he liked gymnastics and he said yes. I then asked him if it makes him a little tired and he said no it makes him a lot tired hahaha. I observed them a few times and they really do a great job.

My daughter went to Spring Break gymnastics camp at Cardinal and had a positive experience in general. The owner, Olga, was very short with me, but my daughter didn’t deal with the owner, she had young girls running the class, so she liked the gym.
After the camp my daughter wanted to have her birthday party there. I said no problem. I spoke to Olga and paid the fees. The party was set for 121:5 to 1:45. On the day of the party instead of staff greeting us kindly and saying happy birthday to my daughter they immediately informed me that I and to be out of the room by 1:45, even 1:40. Olga was rude and short. At 1:40 she was up in the room as we were scurrying to get things cleaned and she yelled at the children to get out and go downstairs. She said she didn’t yell when I asked her not to, but she did. The party room is embarrassing: stained carpet, dingy walls, hot. I liked Capital’s set up much better, it’s open to the gym and much cooler (we had already paid Cardinal so I couldn’t switch.) No one from Cardinal asked if we had a good time, cared to help us (other than pressuring us to get out), or seemed interested in any level of customer service. If you’re going to bother offering parties than you need to have some sort of customer service to back it up. Big thumbs down.

We’ve had our daughter in the competitive program at Cardinal since 2010 and have been extremely pleased with both the high quality of instruction and the positive environment. My daughter absolutely loves going to class even though it is a fairly «tight ship» as a previous reviewer noted. Olga, the owner, is very warm and friendly once you get to know her. She supervises the training very closely to ensure they are progressing appropriately.

We had signed our 4 yr old daughter up for the 3 – 5 class. The program seemed more like organized play. Now i know what you are saying, its just 3 – 5 yr olds, but considering we had just moved from southern california we had a certain expectation, this was not it. Kelsey (sp) seemed about as disintersted as any one individual can be when it comes to providing some direction. I saw this one poor girl do every activity wrong and end up rolling around on the trampoline. My kid was bored out of her mind and had this wtf look on her face. If you want your child to start with a full blown interest in gymnastics, go out to woodbridge, if you want a watered down version come here, or just go to little gym, its probably cheaper.

We signed up our daughter a few months ago and so far, we are very pleased. The owner is Russian as are some coaches. The owner seems to run a tight ship, but some may find her abrasive. Maybe it’s the cultural differences — I don’t know. My suggestion would be to not let it get to you. The smaller size of the place (as compared to the mega-​academy in Chantilly — which is closer to our home, btw) appeals to us too. I think we’ll probably stick with this place for as long as our daughter has an interest in gymnastics.