These kids may turn “pro”. But hundreds or thousands of others will be inspired to take up the formerly little known sport. My own gym, Altadore, just started Acrobatic Gymnastics this year.
A big theme in the comments of this blog, of late, has been criticism online of gymnasts and ex-gymnasts being fat.
What should we do about that, as a coaching group?
Best, it seems to me, is to confront the issue. And who are the best spokespeople? Gymnasts themselves.
It’s easy for a genetic ectomorph like Shannon Miller to be a role model for low body weight.
Mesomorphic women like Shawn Johnson more often have a tougher time keeping excess weight off. Here she talks about healthy body image.
… “There’s a huge push in the world on an image, a stereotypical, beautiful model image, especially in gymnastics,” Johnson said. “I was a huge target for that.”
She said it wasn’t unusual to hear stories in her sport about cases of anorexia and bulimia. She said that her 4 foot 11 inch muscular build wasn’t popular with some on Dancing with the Stars, either. Johnson said she was frequently compared to Holly Madison.
“I don’t know if you girls know who that is, but she’s a model and she’s like tiny and tall! And they’re like, ‘You have to become her,’ and I’m like, ‘I’m 4 foot 11, that’s not possible,'” Johnson said. …
If you want to be a high level gymnast, percentage body fat is an important variable. But after retirement, it’s not a big deal. Most of the ex-gymnasts I know are far leaner than the general population.
In 2009, John R. Wooden was named The Sporting News “Greatest Coach of All Time”
Not many would dare argue.
John Wooden was the coaches coach. A purist.
Seven Point Creed
John Wooden’s Seven Point Creed, given to him by his father Joshua upon his graduation from grammar school:
Be true to yourself.
Make each day your masterpiece.
Help others.
Drink deeply from good books, especially the Bible.
Make friendship a fine art.
Build a shelter against a rainy day.
Pray for guidance and give thanks for your blessings every day.
Wooden also authored a lecture and a book about the Pyramid of Success. The Pyramid of Success consists of philosophical building blocks for winning at basketball and at life. In his later years he has been hired by corporations to deliver inspirational lectures and even appeared in commercials for Hartford Insurance and the NCAA. It is generally known that he received lecture fees that exceeded the salaries he was paid as a coach. Wooden proudly claimed that these late in life windfalls allowed him to set up education accounts for all of his grandchildren. In a 2009 interview, John Wooden described himself politically as a “liberal democrat,” who had voted for some republican presidential candidates.”
Among Wooden’s maxims:
Failing to prepare is preparing to fail.
Flexibility is the key to stability.
Be quick, but don’t hurry.
Coach Sommer of GymnasticBodies.com (author of Building the Gymnastic Body) clarifies confusion on two recent posts:
Huang Yubin is not exaggerating. This is a very serious problem for China.
For some time now, the Chinese program has focused on the development of event and multi-event specialists. Now with the change in the Olympic Team format from 6 to 5 athletes, the effective possible roles for specialists have been drastically reduced while the importance of strong all arounders as the majority of your competitive team on the floor cannot be overstated. Especially in a 3 up 3 count format. This is a tremendous disadvantage in the team competition as strong Chinese All Arounders are relatively scarce.
The Japanese however are not affected in the least by this Olympic Team format change. While the rest of the world emphasized the development of specialists, the Japanese continued to select their Teams (National, World and Olympic) solely by their all around ranking at the various qualification meets.
Yours in Fitness,
Coach Sommer
No wonder Rings Olympic Champion Chen Yibing is back training the all-around.
No one understands better the importance of symbolic imagery than totalitarian governments. One day this photo will be revered in China. But not in 2010.
The new process is still evolving. Many are confused, including me.
Is this correct?
Teams of five gymnasts … UPDATE. Six gymnasts at World’s, but only five at Olympics.
October 2010 – World Championships Rotterdam – top 24 teams advance
2011 – World Championships Tokyo – top 8 teams advance to Olympics & top 3 individuals on each apparatus (if not on one of the teams)
2012 – Olympic Qualifier London – only the teams ranked 9-16 compete with the top 4 of those 8 teams advancing to the Olympics. Or do all teams compete, qualification affecting only the teams ranked 9-16 from Tokyo?
SIIMPLE. … As simple as Facebook Privacy settings.
Here we go again … What unforeseen problems do you foresee?
Worse is the change in the competition calendar for Rotterdam.
Dwight Normile:
… For years, the men’s qualification rounds preceded the women’s (actually, this has varied over the years), but the schedule printed on the official Rotterdam worlds website has the women’s prelims on Oct. 16 and 17, followed by the men’s prelims on Oct. 18 and 19.
The women’s team final is slated for Oct. 20, the men’s on Oct. 21. Then it gets weird.
Both the men’s and women’s all-around finals are scheduled for the same day, Oct. 22, with the men’s at 4 p.m. and the women’s at 7:30 p.m. So much for celebrating your team victory the night before if you are an all-arounder.
I feel for any all-arounder from a top-eight team, such as Japan’s Kohei Uchimura or Germany’s Fabian Hambüchen. These guys will have to gear up for the all-around final less than 24 hours after competing in the emotionally draining team final, where they might have performed on all six events. It will be completely understandable if any of these guys fails to reach his potential in the apparatus finals the following two days.
Why schedule the men after the women for the prelims and team finals, only to reverse them for the all-around finals? With only four events (and eight skills counting) compared with six (10 skills) for men, it is far easier for female gymnasts to compete back-to-back all-around competitions than it is for men. …
Gak. It’s much more complicated than I thought. There are going to be many not chosen, irate at F.I.G.
This much complexity was not needed. The main change desired was to get the top 3 on each apparatus at the last World Championships qualified to the Olympics. There are easier ways to make that happen.
The new process is still evolving. Many are confused, including me. 
Gymnastics Coaching.com 