local sports / neighbors

East Valley gymnastics coach with ALS dies

Coach and former Aspire student Brian Kern helps coach Rob Survick get his chair across the gym during Aspire’s 30th birthday celebration Sept. 13, 2025 at the gymnastics facility in west Chandler. Survick died Jan. 21 from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS.

Independent Newsmedia file/Jason W. Brooks

Rob Survick, a former Arizona State University gymnast and longtime coach at the Aspirte gymnastics facility in west Chandler, died Jan. 21 from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS.

Courtesy of Scott Barclay

This week, Scott Barclay sent out the news release he probably knew he’d have to make — albeit probably sooner than he anticipated.

Barclay, owner of Aspire, a gymnastics gym in west Chandler, announced coach Rob Survick died on Jan. 21. He was 48.

Survick had amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, for the past nine years, Barclay said in the news release, though the coach and former Arizona State University gymnast wasn’t officially diagnosed until 2020.

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