Another great clip from GymSmarts – The Gymnastics Minute.
When you start twisting gymnastic skills, determining which way you are twisting is extremely important. Here George Hery show how he figures out which way a gymnast is twisting. He’s used this method for over 20 years.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
This can be confusing for the athlete. And sometimes the coach.
Men’s competitive coaches are rarely confused as they’ve trained or coached Kasumatsu vault. (1/4 on, 3/4 off)
But since most female gymnasts do not train “Kaz”, twist direction of the round-off can generate arguments. If some coach disagrees with coach Hery, wrap a rope around his waist and have him do a round-off on Floor. … Then check the direction of twist of the rope.
The rope doesn’t lie.
related posts:
• deciding twist direction based on round-off
• preventing “barani confusion“
8 comments ↓
As I said on the comments on youtube, this is an excellent video and should be required viewing for every coach.
I’ve run into plenty of men’s coaches who don’t understand this. And as far as women’s coaches, I’ve probably run into more that don’t understand it than I have that do.
I am not sure what he as concluded at the end. I think he needs to explain that one better, because it all made sense until he started talking about putting round-offs in closets and baranis.
I’m always amazed at the coaches that think a barani should be the same as a round-off, or those that think it should automatically be opposite of a round-off.
After determining an athletes dominant twisting direction, just make sure the barani twists that way, regardless of which way they do a round-off. A round-off isn’t really a twisting skill anyways.
Shocking to me that this is even an issue – basic gymnastics knowledge….
Agreed with Coach S. A roundoff should be treated as being completely unrelated to any twisting skills, and should not be used as a tool to train them. This should be the policy right up until the gymnast is preparing to learn twisting tsuks or kazamatsus, at which point the gymnast’s roundoff and their twisting direction must be taken into account. A tsuk 1/1 and a kazamatsu are two completely different skills, and should be approached as such. The methods used to train a tsuk 1/1 and a kazamatsu are completely different, and it is important for high level coaches to understand this.
Agreed that round-off is not a “twist” skill.
Best case scenario the coach should decide the best direction for round-off based on cartwheel.
And later decide best twist direction for salto skills by trying many twisting drills in each direction.
… For Artistic gymnasts, however, there is a big advantage in a gymnast who puts the right hand down first on round-off doing salto twists to the right.
Male gymnasts can do Kaz vaults. Female gymnasts can tumble out of 1 1/2 twist more easily.
Given the largely DIY nature of coaching education in the US, I think there will always be coaches who haven’t learned twisting yet. Eventually, they will get it. The problem is, newbies might not realize what a big issue twisting is. They could teach rec and compulsories for years and collect information on all the skills they need for that but never think about twisting until they start coaching optionals, if they ever do.
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