The advantages of spotting are highly over-rated.
From Dr. Bill Sands, research on emergency rescue spotting:
… the act of rescue spotting is at the very least extraordinarily difficult. The fact that coaches can perform a rescue spot at all is astonishing (and I have seen some spectacular saves, even been the recipient of a few from my coach a million years ago).
However, I believe that the coach, athlete, parent, and legal communities must come to understand the inherent limitations that constrain rescue spotting. Not only is not spotting a fail-safe, sometimes hand spotting of an unplanned fall effectively is IMPOSSIBLE. The impossibility of some hand spotting should be communicated to coaches, athletes, and parents so that all understand the physical and biological constraints on hand spotting and no one expects more from the spotter than the spotter can deliver.
My philosophy is: The Less Spotting, The Better.
Very few spotters are as good as Don Eckert, technical director of Woodward West Gymnastics Camp, here coaching at Stars Gymnastics in Colorado Springs:
Click PLAY or watch an emergency rescue spot on YouTube.
more Salto Cafe videos
Interesting trivia in North American English terminology:
Hartley Price: Coined the Term “Spotting.” In 1930 Price, recently graduated from Springfield College, was hired to coach at the University of Illinois. He was an excellent recruiter and gathered together some of best gymnasts in the country. He founded the University of Illinois Gymkana which put on shows to raise money and found ways for his gymnasts to earn money to pay their tuition.
“Doc” wasn’t much of a coach. His theory was, “Put the best gymnasts in the country together in the same gymnasium and they’ll coach each other.” That they did, winning five NCAA team titles in eighteen years.
He tried to emphasized safety by painting a large white circles (4′ in diameter) on the gymnasium’s walls. He called these “spots.” When his gymnasts saw the spot, they were supposed to think safety and look for those who could assist them through one element or another. Such assistance became known as “spotting.”
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6 comments ↓
I think simply saying “the less spotting, the better” is an oversimplification. It is true that there are often better ways to teach a skill than to hand spot it, but there are also times when the most effective way to teach a skill is to spot a kid, especially on lower-level skills.
For example, when a girl is learning a backhandspring, often the only thing she’s thinking about is getting over. With no focus on staying tight, the skill feels sloppy and scary. And because it’s scary, the kid is just focused on getting over, without giving any thought to staying tight. And round and round it goes.
With a spotter, the kid can have confidence that she’ll make it over safely, and therefore be much more able to focus on making the corrections necessary to do it safely by herself.
Now with higher-level skills, I would agree that it’s generally best to find methods other than spotting to teach a skill.
You are right Geoffrey.
I should have made clearer that I was thinking of “emergency” spotting when I made that statement.
Of course skills like flyaway, backward handspring, giant should be spotted as much as possible in the learning stages to avoid technical and psychological problems later.
Good point.
You are both right! haha.
Ideally yeah spotting is graet in the lower levels, and when drill in reps and reps and reps with technical precisous is the focus. At higher levels the gymnasts have enough experience, confidence, and knowladge of their capabilities to not require constant spotting. Spot them once spot them twice, and then they are away laughing working it indepdantly, or move onto harder drill etc..
However the need for emergency spot is always going to be vital. Even though there is little chance that the coach can do anything to prevent serious disaster, or even react in time. It is always better to have that even 1% chance is always worth it..in the case and example the video..and may i say that is one close call.
Valentin
The Gym Press
http://www.thegympress.net
My daughter was saved from a nasty vault crash by her coach, who is always on guard for her gymnasts at meets. Looking back at the video of the crash I see that the coach was ready for anything.
Over the years that I have watched provincial level gymnastics I have observed that there are the coaches that just stand back and watch and there are the coaches who are ready for what might happen. Which one do you think most parents would prefer.
Whilst trying to save a gymnast might not always work, the work of a good coach can make the difference between a zero and a major injury.
[...] This is not really a “safety” spot. [...]
I was once told by a gym owner who’d been in the biz for, well, longer than I’ve been alive that the spot of “just being there” can be lawsuit potential – because if you’re “just there”, and something happens, who do the parents blame?
But anyways, your post provokes some thought
When I was younger and first started compulsory coaching, I spotted only for dangerous or scary skills and figured, “Why do they need this or that? Why is the head coach doing that?” and then I realized that in the early stages, kids really benefit from what I call “shaping” spots, where you manipulate the body the show the feeling of doing it “right”.
And as mentioned above, it’s great if a kid can do a back handspring by themselves, but if it’s sloppy as all get out, giving them some time to do it feeling “safe” so they can make corrections is SO important.
I think my point is … I learned to stop being so lazy at the lower levels and start getting in there and activating tactile teaching
(That’s what happens when you start coaching higher levels first, and THEN decide to do compulsory levels).
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