Gymnastics Coaching.com

After a terrific experience coaching one season at the Christchurch School of Gymnastics in New Zealand, I’ve encouraged young coaches to consider planning a work holiday to that club.

Even better would be a coaching “exchange”.

A competitive coach from Down Under would come to your gym and replace you — coaching your gymnasts and fulfilling your job description.

You would travel to somewhere — sunny Australia for example — at your own expense and replace that coach.

Both coaches get the chance for a gymnastics / life / travel experience. And neither club needs to replace the coach.

A coach exchange is easy to arrange for Commonwealth countries as a work visa program is available for those under 30-years-of-age. (UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, etc.)

But an exchange between any countries is possible if the coaches “volunteer” in the new gym.

You might even swap accommodation for the course of the exchange.

Leave a comment below if interested.

There is no confusion in Men’s gymnastics regarding the Tsukahara vault.

The near arm is the “push” arm. The far arm the “block” arm.

The near arm is bent (not often this much) and the far arm close to straight.

Kyle Shewfelt

The stronger the gymnast, the more you can bend the near arm.

Bending the arm on contact “absorbs” force, no doubt. The gymnast must then “generate” that amount of force and (hopefully) more.

There is confusion in Women’s gymnastics. I often hear judges, coaches, even respected clinicians speaking against bending the near arm.

That’s a mistake. A throw back to the “old” horse. The old compulsory FIG rules.

To me as a coach, straight arms on contact with the horse means the preflight was too high.

The best female vaulters will have a bent first arm on Tsukahara vaults.

Fact is, there’s no longer any difference between vault for men and women.

young gymnast doing Tsukahara – Woodward West Gym Camp

(Needless to say, I also believe a “half on” into Tsukahara is an error.)

Once the “basics” are “good” … (For Rick McCharles “good” means reasonable form and line. And that the gymnast can keep the feet together on backward handsprings and round-off.) … we can begin to connect skills.

More valuable than back tuck salto is “whip back”.

More valuable than front tuck salto is “whip front”.

Rick asks all first year optional gymnasts to compete at minimum whip front (rather than front tuck) and whip back with half twist (rather than back tuck, pike or layout).

The whip front is learned progressing from flyspring, to 1-arm-flyspring, to no-arm-flyspring.

All advanced tumbling sequences should be learned on soft mats atop the tumbling strip or on trampoline devices.

Click PLAY to see his PowerPoint presentation or watch it on YouTube.

More information on tumbling.

Many of the coaches were interested in the new inflatable tumbling mats available from the USA.

Rick McCharles edits this website for coaches of acrobatic sports. He wants GymnasticsCoaching.com to be a starting point for coaches looking for specific information on topics of interest.

For example, we had a request for information on “club management software”. Rick will research the current options and post that information here when he gets it.

Click PLAY to see his PowerPoint presentation or watch it on YouTube.

The future of coaching, Rick feels, will be video tutorials. For example, coaches are already taking laptops into the gym to better explain the task for the day.

Click PLAY to see an example or watch it on YouTube.

Rick McCharles presented an overview of the issues facing gymnastics coaches who want to use trampolines and trampoline-like equipment.

He feels trampolines are ideal for fun, fitness and fundamentals. But cautions that the general public perceives trampolines as dangerous — and that very “spring” surfaces can be dangerous when not properly supervised.

Gymnastics coaches should bring in trampoline specialists to help design safe training programs.

To see Rick’s presentation notes click PLAY or watch them on YouTube.

More information on trampoline.

Most gyms do not have enough storage space.

One option is to install hardware to hang gear when not in use.

Kingborough Gymnastics, Tasmania.

Rick McCharles uses similar drills for tumbling and vaulting.

For example, we can teach a Handspring vault using “Flyspring” tumbling drills.

He led an in-gym session explaining some of his favourite drills: high reps, low stress. Fun, easy and requiring a minimum of spotting.

To see Rick’s PowerPoint Presentation click PLAY or watch them on YouTube.

More information on tumbling.

More information on vaulting.

Popular in Australia are in-ground trampolines with pit access, many of which have no metal frame on the pit side.

Melbourne, Victoria

At first glance, this looks fantastic. There is now no risk of injury landing on the frame of the tramp while somersaulting into the pit.

But Aussie coaches informed me of a downside.

Since the pit side of the tramp is NOT supported, the bed is SOFT on the pit edge.

All things considered — I still prefer this pit trampoline (made by Acromat over a trampoline with a frame.

)

Rick McCharles presented an in-gym coaching session of some of his favourite drills for girls bars and boys horizontal bar.

The objective is to find drills that work, are fun, are safe, and do not required much “spotting”.

To see Rick’s PowerPoint presentation click PLAY or watch them on YouTube.

More information on bars.

More information on horizontal bar.

I am happy to recommend (almost certainly) the best video resource for recreational coaches available.

It is called “Complete Recreational Gymnastics“, a huge collection (2hrs 43min!) of over 550 skills and drills for coaching girls gymnastics.

Quality is excellent, produced by coach Charles Minster, an expert video editor.

His co-author for this video is Tasmanian coach Mark Moncur from Kingborough Gymnastics.

Games and activities are easy to understand, even for young children.

The resource looks expensive at AUS$120 until you consider that other companies would have sold it as six 30min videos. (I find it far more convenient to have everything on one disk.)

View details and see video samples on-line: “Complete Recreational Gymnastics“. (PAL format)

This DVD is also available in the NTSC format from 10.0 for US$99.

Charles Minster has another video highlighting the coaching philosophy of world expert Colin Still from the UK. (This video is 4hrs 33min! featuring 395 skills and drills!)

And I will soon be reporting more DVDs. Charles is currently in the UK shooting more footage. Minster Productions will be permanently linked under VIDEOS in the right hand navigation column.

Will we see this fantastic content available on-line, as well?