Sunday Funnies: The Pommel Unicorn

Study on the Benefits of Foam Rollers

 Foam rollers have become increasingly popular in recent years- and with good reason.

Study:

Last year we reported on a study that showed that using a foam roller before a workout increased range of motion without decreasing power, suggesting that foam rolling could substitute for pre-run static stretching. Now there's evidence a post-workout roll might also be a good idea.

 In my opinion, stretching before workout is not only not necessary, but potentially counterproductive.

In a study that will be published in Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, 20 men did a workout of ten sets of 10 squats, with each squat at 60% of their one-rep max. Afterward, half of them did 20 minutes of foam rolling on their legs, and the other half followed their usual post-workout routine.

Researchers measured things like muscle soreness, range of motion, and vertical leap 24, 48, and 72 hours after the hard workout.

By all measures, the foam-roller group fared better in the days after their hard workout. They not only had less soreness at all times, but their soreness peaked 24 hours after the workout, while muscle soreness peaked 48 hours after the workout in those who didn't foam roll. The foam-roller group also performed better in tests of vertical leap, range of motion, and muscle contraction.

All of these findings suggest that the post-workout foam rolling helped to speed recovery. In theory, this should allow a higher level of training.

Tip from USA Gymnastics to enhance muscle performance and recovery:


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Live as if No One is Watching

By Daniel Light

Compulsory Level Gymnastics Conditioning

Sunday Funnies

Ultimately, Gymnastics is About Play

"If people never did silly things nothing intelligent would ever get done.” 

–Wittgenstein

 One of the most important aspects of serious gymnastics training is having the chance to play; to remove the stifling constraints of competitive gymnastics and allow exploration, experimentation, and unbridled creativity to flourish (so long as all appropriate waivers have been signed...*ahem*):





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New Level 5 Compulsories

Vault:




Bars:



Beam:


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The Journey of a Thousand Chin-ups begins wtih....

.....a single rep.

SpongeBob Gymnast

How could I have missed this?!







I'm guessing it was released during the time of last year's summer Olympics in McDonald's Happy Meals.

I've never watched SpongeBob Squarepants....but I want one!

The Pig and the Chicken

A Pig and a Chicken are walking down the road.

The Chicken says: "Hey Pig, I was thinking we should open a restaurant!"

Pig replies: "Hm, maybe, what would we call it?"

The Chicken responds: "How about 'ham-n-eggs'?"

The Pig thinks for a moment and says: "No thanks. I'd be committed, but you'd only be involved!"

Moral:  Both athlete and coach need to be on the same page in terms of level of commitment vs. mere involvement.

If the coach cares more about the quality of his athlete's gymnastics than the athlete herself is showing, why should he continue to commit and sacrifice?  And vice versa.


Coach Courtney from the amazing documentary, "Undefeated":



I arranged a movie outing with my girls when that movie came out, right before the Academy Awards.

Stupid is, as stupid does

Never underestimate the power of human stupidity. 

-Robert Heinlein

Gymnastics Stunts in the Footloose Movies

There was a stunt dude there who did the gymnastics flip ‘cause I couldn’t do that. I was going to try, but they wouldn’t let me. 

-Kenny Wormald interview for Footloose remake

A YouTube search for Art Shurlock's McDonald's commercial in '84 had me somehow end up on Footloose.

I had no idea up until half an hour ago that there was a Footloose remake in 2011.

Here is a deleted scene:




Chuck Gaylord was one of Kevin Bacon's stunt doubles for the gymnastics sequences and gymnastics consultant for the movie.  Apparently, Bacon is angry that most of the famous warehouse footage incorporated mostly stunt doubles:

Kevin Bacon says that he did the majority of the dancing in the film, except for the lively warehouse scene.

“I was furious," Bacon, 53, tells People. "It's like a starting pitcher getting taken out of a game – no one wants to be told they can't get the guy out."

"I had a stunt double, a dance double and two gymnastics doubles," he goes on to say. "There were five of us in the f---ing outfit, and I felt horrible."

Moviefone's interview with choreographer Lynne Taylor-Corbett:

Tell us about Peter Tramm, the dancer who doubled for Kevin Bacon.

Taylor-Corbett: Kevin hadn't initially wanted a double. He was so terrific, he worked so hard, but the truth is, you can't fake having danced your whole life. It wouldn't have looked as good as it did and I think we made it look as good as possible. I myself was incredulous with the way it cut together. That scene in the warehouse is always used in clips of 'greatest dance scenes.'

And you had gymnast Chuck Gaylord doubling him on the gymnastics moves!

Taylor-Corbett: Yes, and then there was also a stunt man, so at one time, I had a picture of four Kevins on set!

How was it decided that Kevin Bacon's character would have a gymnastics background?

People magazine:

Choreographer Lynne Taylor-Corbett worked with Bacon for three weeks in preproduction and tailored the steps to his strengths. "Because I'm not a dancer, I don't pick up things immediately," says Kevin, "but I'm not a complete bozo." After the producers decided on the big acrobatics number in the warehouse, the character was transformed into a gymnast. Kevin, who had never been on a high bar before, worked the skin off his hands training. His coach, Chuck Gaylord—who at the same time was preparing brother Mitch Gaylord for the Olympics—was impressed. "I've never trained anyone from ground zero before," says Gaylord, who does one tough stunt on film that double Tramm couldn't handle. "I thought an actor would be a real prima donna, but he worked really hard."

AMC blog:

7. Bacon went through two months of training to get in shape for this role. His 6-hour daily regimen consisted of jazz lessons, modern dance lessons, body building and gymnastics.

8. Kevin Bacon’s gymnastic coach/double was Chuck Gaylord, brother of Olympic champion Mitch. Gaylord performed Footloose's famous dismount, saying, "There's no way to teach a layman a dismount like that."

Anyone know who was Wormald's gymnastics stunt double for the 2011 version?

Grayson and martial arts

Caslin's boyfriend Hisonni Johnson wrote and directed a pilot series, Grayson:  Earth One.  It debuted this last weekend on YouTube as webisode installments.

Series Synopsis: "Grayson: Earth One' is the re-imagined origin story of the hero known as Nightwing/ Richard Grayson. The series takes place in a new continuity on a new Earth separate from the DC Universe, freeing it from continuity restraints.

Starring Stephen McCain as Richard Grayson, Daz Crawford as Dr. Victor Friese, Rileah Vanderbilt as Helena Bertinelli, Angela Gulner as Barbara Gordon and Katie H. Young as Carrie Kelly

Support the project with donations here.





I met up with Steve about a month ago to run through some stick training (he said his character uses two sticks/batons).  I haven't done any serious training in over a decade, but used to be a senior student under Dan Inosanto and was under apprenticeship to Mark Mikita during the 90s.  Steve remembered how much training I was doing in martial arts, at the time, and so gave me a call to do some catching up.

Back then when I was intense about martial arts, I knew a number of guys from the Inosanto Academy who went on to have successful careers in stuntwork.  I taught some of them gymnastics classes and privates while others came in for open gym at SMGC. 

I've met some of the most well-known names in the MA community, as well as trained with and trained under them. In my experience without putting anyone else down, Mark Mikita is quite simply the most well-researched, most well-rounded student, practitioner (master), and teacher of the fighting arts.  He is the "real deal" when it comes to realistic, functionalized fighting and developing adaptability for self-defense in varied, real-world environments, outside of the squared circle or the octagon ring.  He put himself through chiropractic school to better understand how to attack the human skeleton.  He leaves no stone left unturned and brings a variety of combat arts (including combative firearms training) and related fields all under one umbrella, sometimes under the Filipino moniker of "kali" or "escrima".   Essentially, for him, he will utilize whatever works.




For a serious martial artist like Mark who would just as sooner paint all the windows to his school black, invite no one, and keep the training group small and intimate rather than commercialize the art, he too is currently working and starring in an independent film.

In my opinion, he's the best kept secret in the martial arts world.  Where so many people spout on about Bruce Lee's philosophical beliefs as it relates to martial arts, and end up doing exactly what Bruce Lee was against, Mark truly lives and breathes the following:

1.  Research your own experience. 

2.  Absorb what is useful

3.  Reject what is useless.

4.  Add what is specifically your own.

Gymnastics Puzzles

Source:  High Flyers Gymnastics

Monkey Giants

I wonder if a monkey like this would be trainable in doing other skills, including stuff that would be physiologically impossible for a human:



Take him to a pit- dismounts, release-catches...


Notice the wrist shift?  The shortening of the body over the top?


Definitely a candidate for a one-arm release to one-arm catch.


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Gymnast vs Orangutan