Author: Rick Mc

GymSmarts is far and away the best and biggest publisher of gymnastics DVDS.

Here’s there biggest sellers from the past year. (In case you didn’t get the ones you wanted for Christmas.)

SETS
Mas Watanabe’s Tumbling Set
Tony Gehman’s Advance Tumbling Set
Mas Watanabe’s Bar Set
Mas Watanabe’s Vaulting Series
Beth Gardner’s Preschool and Rec Gym 1-3

SINGLE DVDs:
Tammy Biggs – Leaps and Jumps
Tammy Biggs – Beam Complexes
Mary Lee Tracy – Core Strength
Mary Lee Tracy – Circuit Training
Tammy Biggs – Flexibility
Tony Retrosi – 5 Bar Skills
Tammy Biggs – Round-off
Tammy Biggs- Flipping Drills
Tammy Biggs – Aerials

GymSmarts is Tom & Reiko Beach. Click through to their home page if you want more information. Most DVDs are $30.

GymSmarts.com

The World of Gymnastics posted an article called Are Gymnastics Shorts Harmful or Helpful for Your Gymnast?

Often a controversial issue.

First, I will start with the positives. Many girls who wear shorts feel like they need them; wearing them can give them more confidence and make them feel more comfortable with their body. The shorts keep the gymnastics leo in place which helps prevent wedgie picking.

Now for the negatives, shorts are NOT technically part of the gymnastics attire. When working out, the gymnastics shorts tend to twist from side to side. This causes the gymnast to have to stop what they are doing and fix them every time they twist (which is A LOT). Many gymnasts tend to hide behind their shorts. They can’t do gymnastics without them (so they believe). They rely on their mini bike shorts way too much and get very uncomfortable if they are made to take them off. But worst of all, once they are off the wedgie picking doesn’t stop. Without shorts their gymnastics leotards “ride up” even more. For this reason you may think shorts are great because they stop this problem but this IS NOT THE CASE! At gymnastics meets or gymnastics competitions your gymnast CANNOT wear shorts. Since they are NOT use to this, they may forget and pick their wedgies in their routines which will cause them to get a 0.05 deduction for each and every time they do it. This can add up and cost them their placement for an award!

I do not believe gymnastics shorts benefit a gymnast in any way. When my gymnasts ask me about wearing shorts I ask in return, “do you wear shorts over your swim suit when you go swimming”? Of course the answer is always “NO!” Then I tell them, “There is no reason to wear them here either.”

Keep in mind, you should practice the way you compete; this means No gymnastics shorts; at least not for those that participate in gymnastics competitions or gymnastics meets. They can be more harmful then helpful! If you have a correct fitting gymnastics leotard you shouldn’t have problems with picking wedgies anyway.

A good compromise is requiring leotard during routine training but allowing shorts the rest of workout.

Leave a comment if you have an opinion.

The new NCAA season is nearly upon us. I can hardly wait.

The intro-video for the 2010 University of Utah Gymnastic Team.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Utah hosts UCLA Fri. Jan 7th to open the season.

UPDATE: all UTAH GYMNASICS VIDEOS FROM GYMNASTIKE are posted online from one page

Check out the skill our new World Champion is training on Horizontal Bar.

It’s at 5min in a long Japanese interview.

I’ve linked to the correct part of the video. Simply click to watch it on YouTube – 2009.12.17 Kohei Uchimura interview part 2 of 2

Could a male gymnast compete triple back regrasp before a female gymnast competes double back regrasp?

Uchimura seems to be able to do just about anything. With ease.

Barcelona1992 posted the original video on Gymnastike. Thanks.

UPDATE: He’s playing with a handspring front triple full on vault, as well.

AUSTRALIA’S first family of gymnastics has moved …

Vladimir Joura and his wife Irina recently moved from Western Australia to Alexandra Hills to take up the positions of head coach and senior coach respectively of the women’s artistic gymnastics (WAG) high performance program at the Queensland Academy of Sport at Nathan, alongside their 14-year-old daughter and national junior squad member Natalia. …

Star gymnast family moves to Alex Hills

Big sister, 2008 Olympian, Dasha Joura stayed at WAIS. She’s attending University in Perth.

(via #ozgymblog)

This excellent site is posted by Enrique Trabanino from Cincinnati Gymnastics Academy, Mary Lee Tracy’s gym. He is a former National Team member from El Salvador.

He sells his gymnastics coaching Clinics on DVD for $25 each.

There are some free “teaser” clips on his Videos page. One sample.

Looks great.

There are more free Bar training tutorials on his YouTube Channel. (If you’re a Bar coach, you need to see those. Awesome.)

SUBSCRIBE to Enrique’s channel if you want him to post more video.

(via Coaching Gymnastics in the New Millenium)

I’ve always like this young woman. And after this interview, I like her better.

She jokes about being the youngest American Olympian in Beijing …

… “Nobody knew who I was before that day,” she said. “But after that, everybody knew who I was. I was Bridget Sloan, the Olympian. I’ve kind of come out of my shell since then. I can honestly say that at the Olympics, I grew up.”

Sloan is now considered the best all-around gymnast in the world. At national team training camps, she is the go-to person when younger gymnasts seek advice. She gives them pointers like how to deal with the national team coordinator, Marta Karolyi. She warns them: “If you’re not 10 minutes early, you’re late. That’s Marta time.” …

NY Times – Beijing Helped Gymnast See Her Potential

I doubt Bridget will be able to resist offers from the NCAA. It’s a long, long road to London 2012.

http://cdn.pis.picapp.com/IamProd/PicAppPIS/JavaScript/PisV4.js

Follow #bridgetsloan.

I saw this article linked from Gymnastics Examiner’s Gymnastics Week in Review, always a good read.

The only coach from outside China to work with the Chinese team is choreographer Adriana Pop from Romania.

That’s quite a distinction. They must like her work as Pop will return to China in 2010.

… Pop lives and coaches in Marseille, France, but travels extensively designing routines for the national teams of Romania, China and Australia. In the United States, she choreographs exclusively for the Bart Conner Gymnastics Academy.

Pop has created routines for some of the world’s best gymnasts, including reigning world champion Cheng Fei of China and Olympic floor exercise champion Catalina Ponor of Romania. …

Bart Conner Gymnastics Academy

She choreographed Ludivine Furnon (France), Andreea Raducan (Romania) and many others.

… Leave a comment if you’ve heard of any other foreign coach working in China.

Pit floors done…walls coming soon

(via #texasdreams – yFrog)

My home gym is renovating one of our pits. I’m doing some research into foam cubes and suspension systems.

Leave a comment if you have advice for us.

Called Xiao Ruizhi after the Chinese gymnast. And sometimes referred to as “Marinich” after Vitaly Marinich who competed it at about the same time. Watch a video of Vitaly doing it in 1989.

Charlie does a HUGE version. From Stalder. (No name for that variation.)

Some video from a couple of years ago. Charlie Tamayo working on some new skillls.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

See more videos on the Gibson Saltocafe YouTube page.

There’s a thread on the IG Forum right now on women who have competed this skill most famously the 1991 World Champion on Bars, Kim Gwang Suk. She connects it from Tkachev!

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

She certainly deserved to win Bars that year, a giant step forward for North Korea. Unfortunately, she was the first of the age falsification scandal gymnasts.

… The FIG punished the North Korean gymnastics federation by barring their women’s team from the 1993 World Championships. Kim, however, was permitted to keep the medals she had won in international events, including her 1991 World Championships gold. …

That’s what I’d like to see happen if China is found guilty of deliberately falsifying documents for their girls at the 2000 Olympics (ruling Feb. 26, 2010). The athletes should keep the medals, the national federation punished. … And yes I realize that current Chinese athletes would be punished for the mistakes made 10yrs-ago.

Don’t do the crime, if you can’t do the time.