Cute Young Brunette Girl With A White Headband Doing Flexible Exercises With The Gymnastic Hoop

International competitions are split between Juniors, under sixteen by their year of birth; and Seniors, for women sixteen and over again by their year of birth. Gymnasts in Russia and Europe typically start training at a very young age and those at their peak are typically in their late teens (15–19) or early twenties. The largest events in the sport are the Olympic Games, World Championships, and Grand-Prix Tournaments.
History
Rhythmic gymnastics grew out of the ideas of I.G. Noverre (1722–1810), Francois Delsarte (1811–1871), and R. Bode (1881), who all believed in movement expression, where one used dance to express oneself and exercise various body parts. Peter Henry Ling further developed this idea in his 19th-century Swedish system of free exercise, which promoted "aesthetic gymnastics", in which students expressed their feelings and emotions through bodily movement. This idea was extended by Catharine Beecher, who founded the Western Female Institute in Ohio, United States, in 1837. In Beecher's gymnastics program, called grace without dancing, the young women exercised to music, moving from simple calisthenics to more strenuous activities.