Gymnastics Coaching.com

Tom Cruise Spoils Suri: Private Gymnastics Room in Home

That’s the headline of a Post Chronicle article. Celebrity journalism.

Hollywood actor Tom Cruise loves his daughter, Suri Cruise, endlessly – and when you have an endless supply of money, you end up spending it all!

Tom has dropped more than $7,000 on a private play/gymnastics room for daughter Suri – and he’s having it built in their Manhattan apartment.

An insider tells Star Magazine: “Because Suri loved her private gymnastics class at Chelsea Piers in New York so much, Tom hired the facility to build Suri private gymnasium.”

“[It] will have $7,000 worth of equipment, including two mini trampolines, a balance beam, tumbling mats and a set of bars.” …

Tom has also hired a female instructor to visit and ‘train’ Suri once a week – because the process of bringing Suri to the gym was daunting task. …

Post Chronicle

Suri – Celebrity Babies

Designed to help prevent dorsal hyper-flexion, the Tiger Paw Wrist Support has a replaceable foam pad. To increase the levels of support, extra plastic battens may be inserted in the Velcro pocket.

Tiger Paw Wrist Support – $50 – Gibson Athletic

These have become so popular in North America that they are almost essential equipment for girls over age 12. Yet boys rarely wear them … even though they do much more work on the wrists.

Designed to help prevent wrist pain, the Ezy ProBrace provides strong support in wrist extension and hyperextension but still maintains flexibility. A unique “palmar pad” minimizes the angle to the wrist joint and evenly distributes impact and weight across the palm to cushion high impact forces. Pad is detachable for when the palm of hand needs to be exposed.

Ezy ProBrace by Gibson – $51 – Amazon.com

At my gym over half the older girls wear Tiger Paws. When I quizzed them, they were unanimous:

“If you don’t need them, don’t wear them. But if you do need them, wear them as much as possible. They really reduce wrist pain while training.”

Fad or training essential? Leave a comment if you have an opinion.

==== UPDATE:

From Chris in the comments:

The question that I have is how much are we loading the elbow and shoulder with the use of these? Whenever you bind a joint, the load is going to be transferred up the kinetic chain. Looking at the lower extremity, it’s very common to tape ankles or wear ankle braces in many sports. A lot of coaches see this as a preventative mechanism. But, how much load is being transferred to the knee and hip and what are the repercussions? Joints are built to go through a particular range-of-motion as that allows them to aid in force dissipation and energy absorption when combined with eccentric (lengthening) muscle activity.

The upper extremity is not as well explored in research as the lower extremity because it is structurally more complex than that of the lower extremity. So this is an interesting question yet to be answered.

I have no issues with wearing these if the kids are experiencing pain. Some simply do not have the wrist flexibility for some of the wrist extension/hyperextension positions that they are forced into. I can attest that I feel their pain as I’m currently learning to Olympic lift and catching a clean without good wrist flexibility can take its toll, no doubt.

But, I still have questions about their efficacy and drawbacks.

Aussie Olympian gave a big shout out to her guy:

Matt Burgan is a brilliant sports psychologist at W.A.I.S and I owe my training efforts towards Olympic trials to him. After 2007 I was in a really bad training slump and all hope seemed to be lost. My dream of going to the Olympics was still there but my motivation to train 100% for it was at its lowest. Matt gave me a hard reality check and basically told me to give it my all or go home. He then helped me every step of the way to get back into a correct training pattern. I look back at that moment now and I can see that was the turning point.

Olivia Vivian – W.A.I.S. blog

related post: More From Camp Orange – Australian Gymnastics Blog

When you get the right sport psychologist, GREAT.

But I’ve seen too many situations where someone who does not really understand gymnastics is brought into a gym “looking” for problems. At times they are more trouble than they are worth.

The coach is the main psychologist.

A weird story from the NCAA:

Jon Valdez has resigned after eight years as a University of Illinois men’s gymnastics coach amid a university police investigation into allegations of possible misconduct by Valdez, sources said.

Assistant athletic director Kent Brown confirmed Monday that Valdez had left his job Oct. 17 for “personal reasons,” but Brown would not confirm that Valdez was being investigated.

Responding to a Tribune inquiry, Robin Kaler, the university’s associate chancellor for public affairs, said, “There is an investigation into a camera found in a locker room on campus.”

The school would not confirm whether the investigations were connected.

Valdez, a U.S. Olympic coach in Beijing and personal coach for bronze medalist Justin Spring, had been on the Illini coaching staff since 2000. Neither Valdez nor Spring, who is in his first year as an Illini assistant coach, could be reached for comment.

Ivan Ivankov of Belarus, a two-time world all-around champion, is among those whom the university has interviewed to replace Valdez.

Olympic all-around gold medalist Paul Hamm, whose name has been mentioned as a possible replacement, said Monday via phone, “I heard the job was open and discussed it with Justin, but [seeking the job] is not an option I intend to pursue.”

Chicago Tribune

I’ve seen even worse accusations against Valdez posted on forums.

We’ll wait and see what happens with the investigation.

(via Gymblog)

We posted the new world record after World’s 2007.

Here’s another video from that competition.

Click PLAY or watch Ivanonv on YouTube.

Thanks MissEducated.

by site editor Rick McCharles

My home gymnastics club is still looking for a Head Women’s Coach with experience coaching to the National Level. Great facility. Great salary.

Check the job blurb, if interested: Gymnastics Coaching job in Calgary, Canada

You would be working with our excellent 32-year-old Romanian coach, Mihai.

website – Altadore Gymnastics Club

John Crumlish posted a great interview on I.G. with Romanian superstar gymnast now coaching in Northern Ireland. It goes into much more depth than usual.

Eugenia Popa (Romania) at the 1991 Worlds

This quote caught my eye:

IG: As the product of such a systematic training program in Romania, how have you been able to adjust to a different style of coaching in another country?

EP: It’s very hard, but I was quite young when I came here, and I didn’t coach long enough in Romania to have that strict kind of approach where you had to do what your coach tells you, no matter what. Here, I found it difficult at first. It’s an attitude thing. You have to say, “If you want to do it, fine, but if you don’t, there’s nothing I can do about it.” It is frustrating because you get kids who are so talented and you want to do so much with them, but you can’t. It’s very much a struggle, but I suppose you just have to adjust. You have no choice, really. You know you can do more, but at the same time, you can’t. The kids have the freedom to say yes or no. We (in Romania) had the freedom to say yes or no, but if it was no, there was no second chance. …

I have a Romanian coach in my gym experiencing the same frustration.

If you push too hard in a “free” country, the kids will switch to another sport. Or not attend regularly.

Coaching in a free country is much more challenging. But what system would Eugenia prefer for her own daughter?

Popa and daughter, Ellie, at the Salto gym in Lisburn, Ireland

read the entire article with more photos and video: Interview: Eugenia Popa (ROM)

Altadore Gymnastics just got a new double-mini built by Gaofei in China. (Thanks Dave. Thanks Liang.)

Here is coach Tammy Stephenson trying to level it. And get it to F.I.G. specs.

more photos – flickr

A Canadian gymnast stylized this photo. Nice.

The New York Times posted a great article and video on free running.

In the sport of parkour, people leap off railings, jump over walls, and generally use the urban environment as their playing field. Most practitioners are men, but now women are joining the ranks.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Men practicing “free running” are often stronger in the upper body than women. But the girls have some advantages too.

… Asked what weight training goes into preparing for the pulling and pushing of the sport, Sha Mialimm Ak, 18, said: “There really isn’t any. It’s about using your body weight. So you can do push-ups and pull-ups. But it’s not important to have muscular arms to do this. It’s better to have flexibility in the whole body.” …

Climbing Walls Because They’re There – NY Times