Parkour in the Backyard

When you see free running / parkour highlight videos on YouTube, it often looks like the sequence is done ad-lib.

Fact is, to survive, free runners must train. Carefully.

Increasingly the training resembles gymnastics training. Here bigboobspecial practices on the frame of his trampoline.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

(via FlipCatch)

gloves for bar safety straps

As a follow up from our post gymnastics bar safety straps

From Evelyn in Ireland:

We use the exfoliating gloves that you can usually buy in any normal chemist/supermarket/drugstore. They work perfect. They are a bit rougher than normal woolen gloves to give more grip. They are inexpensive and the kids can buy them in a variety of different colours which keeps them happy!!

safety-strap-gloves

🙂

Kyle Shewfelt – KidSport PSA

The 2004 Olympic Floor Champion did a nice Public Service Announcement on TV featuring gymnasts from his original club, Altadore.

Click to watch it.

Kidsport_LogoKidSport Mission:

We believe that no kid should be left on the sidelines and all should be given the opportunity to experience the positive benefits of organized sports. KidSport provides support to children in order to remove financial barriers that prevent them from playing organized sport.

We do this by:

Raising funds in the community to pay registration fees for KidSport™ kids to participate in sport programs.
Gathering used equipment for KidSport™ kids to use in sport programs.

Advocating the value and benefit of kids playing sports in the pursuit of lifelong health and wellness.

Raising funds in the community to pay registration fees for KidSport™ kids to participate in sport programs.

We believe that through participation in organized sport activities, kids learn the values of:

  • Co-operation
  • Team play and friendship
  • Commitment to goals
  • Personal excellence
  • Healthy competition
  • Self-esteem
  • Bruno Kammerl Megawoosh – how he did it

    UPDATE: The first video posted was wrong. The final edit is here now. Thanks Geoffrey.

    One of the hottest viral videos of the last couple of days shows a man in a neoprene suit on a DIY waterslide, flying 115 feet and then landing safely in a kiddie pool

    Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

    It’s part of a Microsoft promotion.

    Click through if you want to know how it was done.

    U.S. Trampoline Champion – Nani Vercruyssen

    Nani
    Nani
    Nani Vercruyssen marks her first seven months as a senior elite (18+ yrs) by winning the US elite gymnastics national championships in both individual and synchronized trampoline.

    And, because of her first place ranking, she was also selected to represent the US at the 2009 World Cups in Belgium and Poland plus the World Championships in Russia.

    At the VISA Gymnastics Championships held this past week at the Dallas Convention Center, Vercruyssen first won the senior women’s synchronized trampoline event with partner Alaina Williams of Huntsville, AL. She then tied with Williams in the senior women’s individual trampoline event but was named the overall champion according to a tie-breaking policy whereby the title is given to the athlete receiving the highest execution scores.

    Vercruyssen started at the bottom of the senior elite ranks in January and quickly moved up to her current rank as America’s best female senior elite in trampoline gymnastics after having been the world champion for athletes under 18 years of age for the past four years.

    Thanks Hal Halverson for forwarding us this information.

    Go Nani!

    Vercruyssen leaves Saturday 22Aug09 for her first World Cup competitions in Belgium and Poland. Vercruyssen is the first gymnast from Hawaii to compete at this level.

    Vercruyssen is coached by her mother (Dr Donna Mah) and father (Dr Max Vercruyssen). She trains, coaches national-level teams, and judges at Hawaii Academy in Kalihi and attends Roosevelt High School where she is a senior.

    source – Hawaii Girl Wins National Trampoline Championship

    gymnastics bar safety straps

    Altadore Gymnastics has 3 safety strap bars. What a luxury!

    Only 2 have PVC pipe.

    bar-safety-strap.jpg
    larger version – flickr

    Actually, this is my least favourite system. Using the pipe means the kids do not need to flip their wrists in handstand.

    My favourite is this system:

    … 2 inch (5cm) wide straps with long sport socks (from the lost & found) wrapped around the bar. I want to simulate the feel of the actual wooden rail for the girls.

    straps-MS.jpg
    Mountain Shadows Gymnastics

    However, the PVC pipe is easier for beginners. It would be ideal to have both systems on each straps rail in your gym.

    related posts:

  • video – gymnastics safety bar straps
  • new video – Working the Strap Bar
  • I’ve had a couple of emails lately on how long the straps should be. I find most kids use straps between 26-35cm long, sewn in a loop from 55-75cm length of nylon webbing. (That’s 10-14″ long, from a length of material 21-30″ long.)

    Or … you could simply buy them from 10-0. Note that those are the narrower 1″ version.

    amazing – North Korean Circus

    From an August 2008 performance in Netherlands of the National Circus of North Korea Pyongyang.

    Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

    I saw this linked by Trampoline and Tumbling Coach Brett MacAulay on Facebook.

    who invented the Tkachev?

    Why Alexandre Tkatchev, of course.

    The story goes – true or not – that biomechanists dreamed up the “reverse hecht”, not coaches. And that Alexandre was the first to show it in competition in 1977.

    Here he is in the Olympics Games 1980. (Deltchev from Bulgaria won Horizontal Bar.) Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

    Tkatchev is a coach at West Valley Gymnastics in California.

    Deltchev owns Deltchev Gymnastics in Nevada.

    Leave a comment if you know more of the history of Tkachev.

    What woman competed it first internationally?

    Related posts:

  • gymnastics – Tkachev plus! (Cade Raggio)
  • Jordan Moore – highest Tkachev?
  • are you ready for American Ninja Warrior?

    Justin Moodley emailed looking for superbly fit athletes:

    casting for G4’s American Ninja Warrior. If you don’t know, it’s a competition show where people from all around the world travel to Japan to take on a crazy obstacle course. We have all the live audition details and you’re able to submit a video through our site if you can’t make the open call in Los Angeles. …

    Ninja-Warrier

    details – Got Cast

    related posts:

  • TV – Ninja Warrior
  • incredible upper body strength