Gymnastics Coaching is an aggregator . We try to link to the best of the best published online in English. The most interesting ideas, photos and videos.
Artistic Gymnastics – best of 2011 categories:
INDEPENDENT SITES (blogs, coaches, etc.)
OFFICIAL SITES (magazines, organizations, FIG, NOCs, etc.)
PHOTO & VIDEO SITES
Artistic Gymnastics, especially WAG, dominates the Gymternet over all other acrobatic disciplines. That’s OK since we want every child to start with Artistic & Trampoline before specializing.
Artistic Gymnastics is the Foundation.
_____ INDEPENDENT SITES:
The very best have not changed much since a year ago:
Those sites post prolifically. Each is quite unique. Please subscribe, follow and/or like those as well as others listed here that don’t post quite so often. (A much longer list of sites we follow is listed in the right hand navigation of every page on this site.)
The excellent Gymnastics Minute videos were Tony’s idea, originally. Sadly we’ve seen few new videos from publisher GymSmarts, long the #1 production house for coaching videos.
John Geddert has been posting online for a few years. But in 2011 he became the elite coach who communicates online the most. I get something from John every day:
• Jennifer Isbister’s Gymn.ca (Canada) … perhaps the original dedicated National site
Recent Couch Gymnast graphic
_____ OFFICIAL SITES:
I link a lot to IG. Dwight Normile, Amanda Turner, John Crumlish & team – International Gymnast magazine online News | Facebook | @intlgymnast
Last year and again this year I was astonished at the quality of communications out of USA Gymnastics and FIG. Those organizations have media people equal the best bloggers. In the past information from both was whitewashed — no bad news. But both have gotten increasingly open, over time.
I’ve long criticized Inside Gymnastics magazine. But the IG2 posts were better this year, I thought. Especially during LIVE events. And especially on Facebook.
Universal SportsTumble Mumble is an interesting kind of page. Interspersed between news articles from Reuters and AP are blog posts from Blythe Lawrence, Andy Thornton and others.
The best thing that ever happened for gymnastics coaches is YouTube. Thank Google for buying that company and letting us share with the world for free. In 2011 I still link to YouTube over Vimeo and others as YouTube streams quickest over a weak WiFi signal.
Some of my favourites this past year:
• American Gymnast Gymnastics on Demand videos on the JoeLangley YouTube channel (1150+ coaching tutorials)
Inside Gymnastics has the photographer I link to most. That’s the terrific Grace Chiu. She uses Facebook perfectly, posting a few of her best shots in order to promote sales from GraceClick.ca.
There are a number of equally wonderful photographers around the world. But many are over-protective. Almost nobody sees their work. Foremost of those is the great Eileen Langsley.
Did I MISS one of your favourite sites? … or links to their content?
… Leave a comment and I’ll update this list in a week or so. I could name many more.
Path 1 was considered a joke when originally announced because of it’s 150-friend limit. Then they turned down $100 million Google dollars buyout.
Confident, or what.
Indeed. It may be that private social networks like Path might be the future. I’d like to test it by having all of my coaching staff, or all my competitive team, sign up for the same Path.
… It’s essentially a Facebook-lite/virtual world mashup that allows prepubescent youth to share, comment and like their friends’ updates, pictures, videos and more, while also meeting the protections dictated by the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA).
… Woozworld now has over 15 million unique visitors per month from over 180 countries. The users have created over 8 million avatars and 16 million virtual spaces, and play for an average of 50 minutes per day. …
Previously in beta, the new social networking service officially rolls out on Tuesday here on www.woozworld.com. …
If someone you are not yet friends with on Facebook tries to send you a personal message, you are not notified. It’s hidden away in a place called “Other Messages” — even if you have minimal privacy settings.
When I checked my “Other Messages” I had missed some important events.
On the upside, I think the new Facebook Timeline is pretty cool. Easy to install. And you can test it for a week before showing the world. Here’s how to set it up in two clicks.
If you’re not exhausted by online polls, head over to this one — far more entertaining than most.
On the other hand, you are required to answer ALL questions, even those you don’t have an opinon on. AND the number of choices are restricted on most. (There should be a write-in choice for each.)
Inside Gymnastics readers, let your voices be heard! It’s time for our Annual Reader’s Choice awards, decided by, well, you of course! Complete the survey below and look for the winners to be announced in our January/February 2012 issue!
It’s lengthy. But I was happy to see online categories included:
Best Gymnastics Blog?
Andy Thornton, American-Gymnast.com
Gymnastics Examiner
GymnasticsCoaching.com
Doug’s Blog, TumblTrak.com
Other…
Twitter is like Facebook … with most of the best features removed. You either hate twitter, or love the minimalist, often cryptic, comments. Like Haikus.
But hate it or not, twitter is here to stay.
Happily, they’ve just announced some major improvements soon to be rolled out.
Mihai (mikeyy) Parvulescu of fangymnastics is conducting an online survey about Romanian Artistic Gymnastics.
… The main objective of this survey is to determine the way Romanian gymnastics is perceived by its fans and supporters. We all know that the Romanian delegation returned home without any medal from this year’s Worlds. Through this survey we want to find out what are the problems of Romanian gymnastics and how can we try to solve them or to bring in some advice.
We would be very grateful if you were willing to fill in and to help us sharing it.
A place to pick up a drill
A place to share a drill
A place to share a video of a new skill
A place to tell a funny story
A place to share a review/ report on a competition or training camp
Tony Retrosi is the head coach and owner of Atlantic Gymnastics. He is a popular lecturer at State, Regional, and National Congresses, and also a guest clinician at training camps nationwide. In 2010, Tony was celebrated as USA Gymnastics’ Educator of the Year.
