Wow.
This short clip shows most of the “big trick” moments in gymnastics history.
Shame it is so hard to watch in the low resolution flash format.
Click PLAY, or watch extreme tumbling on YouTube.
Grant Golding – class of Elite Canada
For once I was a spectator at the Canadian Men’s National Team Selection Meet, not a judge.
After a long break from competition (training with Cirque du Soleil for some months), Grant Golding of University of Calgary never looked better, dominating the Men’s AA.
It left me scratching my head. “How could Grant be named non-competing alternate at Worlds? He looks fantastic.”
Canada came 6th in Denmark without Grant. What would they have done with him on the team?
Everyone agreed Grant’s line, style, extension was much improved. (Perhaps the artistic training at Cirque.)
‘’The hard work and hard training has really paid off,’’ said Golding. ‘’It really feels good to come to this meet and hit all my routines. It gives me a lot of confidence for next year which is a big one for us with the worlds serving as an Olympic qualifier. All the guys know we have to keep working hard.’’
The other big surprise for me was the excellent day 2 competition of young Luke Boyd also from U of C. He hit 6 for 6 and looked very much a Senior competitor.
In Junor, Jayd Lukenchuk of Saskatoon was the winner despite errors. Good gymnastics. Good potential for the future. There are a few more very good prospects in the age group program.
Addition: Thanks to hosts U of C Gymnastics Centre, Unocal Parents Association, Alberta Gymnastics and Gymnastics Canada for hosting the meet, again in Calgary. This has become almost a permanent annual home for the meet, either at U of Calgary or at Calgary Gymnastics Centre.
Canada is strong now. But does not have much depth.
The high performance competitive structure which has developed the excellent current team under National Coach Edouard Iarov, I feel, is too severe. Too discouraging for athletes and coaches.
For example, having Juniors compete FIG is crazy, in my opinion. The boys have too much incentive to do long routines emphasizing difficulty over quality. Under the current international rules, our system should plan to develop difficulty over a longer number of years.
There were many injuries and near injuries. More than in the past.
The current code of points is excellent for deciding the rank of the best 8 in the World. But is dangerous for the vast majority of competitors.
finally some good press – Kazakhstan wins Asiad rhythmics
Kazakhstan won their first rhythmic gymnastics team title with a stylish display at the Doha Asian Games on Saturday.
Japan took the silver medal with 144.750 points, failing to close the gap with Asian champions Kazakhstan, who performed in the final rotation to finish with 148.600 and earned the top combined score on three apparatuses (rope, ball and ribbon).
China took the bronze medal with 142.775 points, ending their sweep of the team titles since rhythmic gymnastics was included in the Asian Games in 1998.
Team leader Aliya Yussupova of Kazakhstan performed with fluid movement, artistry and expression to lift Kazakhstan’s score.
People’s Daily Online — Kazakhstan wins first team title at Asiad rhythmic gymnastics
photos – Aliya Yussupova, Longines Ambassadress of Elegance
comedy – The Platt Brothers
Cy, Cheetah and Boone Platt are the Platt Brothers.
Entertainers, acrobats, dancers and “class clowns”, the brothers have a strong background in gymnastics. We coached together at Woodward West Gym Camp in California over the past two years. They are famously popular coaches.
These guys are huge: tall and muscular. Then they put on fat suits to surprise the audience.
They’ve just announced their new website: ThePlattBrothers.com
It links to a video clip of Cy and Boone doing a recent school performance for children showing a wide variety of the things they do. (Cheetah is back at University at the moment.)
diver Alexandre Despatie – now a movie star
Girls will dig this romantic comedy, I suspect.
The film is called À vos marques! Party!
(On your marks! Party!)
Aside from being a pin-up boy for the sport, Alexandre Despatie is the current World champion at the 1 and 3m springboard and the first diver to have been World champion in the three categories (1, 3, 10m platform).
You can see a teaser video on the official movie blog. The picture itself will not be released until sometime in 2007.
Alexandre Despatie – official website
Nastia Liukin – Geinger
Great photo sequence of Liukin’s sweet layout Geinger.
It comes from one of the free “wallpapers” on Ultimate-Athletes.com.
That is the site which developed website content for Shawn Johnson, Hollie Vise and others.
giant swings – Parallel Bars
Teaching giants (Kenmotsu) on parallel bars, for me, is the same as on horizontal bar: maximize the downswing, optimize the upswing (by shortening the body).
For athletes small enough to be able to not bend knees through the bottom, they can be very similar.
I’ve seen kids do a series of 5 giants very much like horizontal bar. Their coach (Kelly Manjak) experimented with giants to “Tkachev” (reverse straddle cut to handstand) with one of the boys.
There are two main differences between horizontal bar and parallel bars:
The first is the lesser problem. Start by spotting giants without releasing. (Gymnast ends up in an unusual grip.) Add the release and regrasp much later.
The psychological barrier of fear of slipping is more likely what will stop boys from swinging aggressively.
Two tips on parallel bars:
Canadian National Coach Edouard Iarov taught me not to spot the hand on the bar — which was common practice where I coach. This is the giant, he told me. Once a boy feels confident he can “hang on” to the bars, learning the giant is easy.
Secondly, introduce giants facing out on the end of the parallel bars. (The opposite direction of the photo.) If the gymnast ever slips, landing on mats off the end of the bar (flyaway) is much safer. It also requires the gymnast hang on as long as possible — to avoid travelling forwards.
Mike Boyd training giant at Taiso. Coach Rhett Stinson.
A study by Spiros Prassas (somewhat outdated) includes photo series and video clips: Giant Swings on the Parallel Bars
Gymnastics ä½“æ“ – flickr photos
video – Island Tag – gymnastics game
This game is always a winner, quite appropriate for large groups and mixed ability groups. Everyone is moving, all the time.
Here you will see adults playing with kids age 6-16.
About 5 “chasers” carry blocks of foam trying to tag any “runner”. Once tagged, the runner becomes the chaser, the chaser a runner.
Everyone must leap island-to-island (mat-to-mat). Anyone touching the floor is penalized with some quick task — eg. 5 sit-ups — then is back in the game.
Click PLAY or watch the video on YouTube.
coaching tips at competition
Sean McCann, USOC Sports Psychologist, published a thoughtful article in the most recent US Olympic Coach E-magazine.
One of the ironies of a coaching life, is that the great majority of the long hours that elite coaches spend are not evaluated, while a small minority of their work (competition) is endlessly and publicly scrutinized.
McCann offers 10 tips for coaches preparing to do the job. For example:
Prepare for the worst (but expect the best). Coaching in the last few minutes is much easier when you have done all the work you needed to in the hours, days, weeks, and months, preceeding the last few minutes. …
When you have effective contingency plans for the worst case scenario, you can relax as a coach. You can only know if they are effective if you have actually practiced these situations in training.
Essentially, the goal is to organize competition simulations in which your athletes have to handle conditions at least as tough as the worst case scenario. Examples include competing without a normal warm-up, changing the time of competition, playing loud crowd noise (USOC Sport Psychology has a 30 minute crowd noise CD we have distributed to coaches and athletes), and any other logistical wrinkle or challenge you can throw at your athletes.
Gymnastics Coaching.com 