… in order to go fast in the development of a gymnast, we need to go SLOW. Coaches need to make the athletes and parents understand that Gymnastics is a long term sport, especially if seeking to reach a high level of competition. Strong basics and fundamentals are key to the success of any athlete in any sport.
The tap swings(on Uneven Bars) are a perfect example of something we need to take a LONG time on. It doesn’t matter if a gymnast already has the correct body shape in the transfer between the hollow-arch-hollow….. it needs to be repeated many times so it can be strengthen and “recorded” in the brain. …
Reading this post I was reminded of the philosophies of David Kenwright.
Click PLAY or watch the video on YouTube.
8 comments ↓
Awesome Rick. Anything David has to say or does is worth copying!
If the gymnast has the correct body shape they can advance to the next drill. The coach just has to continue training the fundamentals the same as they would continue training push-ups.
What continues to baffle me is why so many coaches continue to not follow suit? David is an incredible coach and his athletes clearly show it. Enrique, the coach who wrote the post, is a remarkable coach. So, why do so many coaches not see their success and follow what they are doing? It makes no sense to me.
And, it’s obvious that most coaches don’t follow these philosophies based on the quality of gymnastics that I see out of most teams/clubs.
I dont know how it works in canada, but in the us there is alot of pressure put on coaches by parents to train skills first.
Good point, Diana.
I’ve often let kids compete skills that weren’t as ready as I’d like. For various reasons including that the gymnast was desperate to include a key skill.
Coaches with more discipline, John Smith from NASA comes to mind, I admire.
It’s true that in a fast-food mentality if the parents don’t see skills, they run to the gym that WILL teach their child skills. It’s not enough to make me go against my principles, but sometimes I do push skills earlier than I’d like because if the kid doesn’t compete something soon, the parents get antsy. However, I have a threshold. I may give the kid the benefit of the doubt for a time but if there is no improvement of the quality of the skill, there are consequences.
From what I have seen and researched (and I could be wrong) that kids in Romania and Russia, for instance, don’t compete until our equivalent of Level 7/8.
[...] When it comes to difficult skills like round-off, go slow to go fast. [...]
[...] out, instead of a correct hollow with flat hips, they are at a big risk for overuse injuries. go SLOW to go FAST — Gymnastics Coaching.com Reply With Quote vBulletin.events.SkimlinksActivate.subscribe(function() [...]
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