Sunday Funnies

Source

People Try Gymnastics for the First Time (Go Broadway!)

Partner Core Training

Some good ideas:

"The Miracle Device the Cure"

Check this out:

Sunday Funnies

Source

Daisharin Tetsubo-kun Horizontal Bar Gymnast Game

Greg Roe linked to this Japanese gymnastics toy.  (If you care to spend over $70, click here; or check the website).

 Ok, I couldn't resist and bought one with my PayPal credit.  You can find more videos of this toy linked on YouTube.  Examples:




Also on eBay, found this:

This kinetic motion one looks pretty cool.

Team Building Island Hopping Challenge

Sunday Funnies

Source

Great spotting or predictable good spotting?

A number of people seem to be praising this- non-gymnasts and gymnasts alike- due to the fantastic rescue spotting being performed....twice:

Italian gymnast Sara Berardinelli had a bit of trouble with the uneven parallel bars at the L’International Gymnix competition in Canada, but fortunately her coach was there to bail her out of trouble. When Berardinelli just missed clearing the bar, sending her spinning to the ground, Berardinelli’s coach stopped her momentum just a few inches from the mat.

Berardinelli reacts to the fall like a total pro. Despite nearly landing on her head, she immediately pops up without missing a beat and gets ready go back on the bars. She made the same mistake again, but her coach was in the right place at the right time.

 That she does this a second time and that her coach catches her a 2nd time, makes one wonder if Berardinelli hasn't hit the bar like this before during practice and he already was anticipating what might happen that first time.

Some commenters also question the coaching judgment, wondering that she shouldn't be competing this; but spend more time on practicing the technical aspect. 

The problem in my opinion is that improving upon the technical aspect of this technique isn't the primary problem:  It's teaching this kind of technique, itself- the swing through bail with no real tap and up to handstand, arch and sit-up then dump yourself over the bar kind of technique usually only seen in women's gymnastics; as opposed to the technique taught "men's style", push away from the bar and open on the bail, kick forward early and pull down on the bar, stop the feet and throw.  This type of technique is more a "true" Tkatchev, generating strong counter-rotation and not just a sit up, fall on the other side of the bar with no swing.

 Even in prelims, you can see she barely scrapes over the bar:

I know a lot of girls are successful with this kind of technique (maybe Berardinelli herself, usually has a hit more than miss percentage, too); but I think it's bad technique.

The Rice Bucket Challenge

The gym had finally gotten my request for a rice bucket, on my birthday, last month.  We only have it for team use, so as to minimize any likelihood of rice spillage.  It's a minute for each grain of rice found on the floor, that the last person who used the bucket has to go around and pick up trash in the gym.  So whoever is having rice time needs to be responsible for the previous person as well as for himself, by making sure any grain outside of the bucket goes back in, after he's done.

The first day, the young ones were obsessed with knowing all about it.  I told them to stay away, like it was Pandora's box.  After a few days, I still hadn't covered the rice bucket with the lvl 3s.  So come Monday after we got the bucket, throughout workout, every single one of the 3s at some point was gripping her wrist asking to do the bucket.  This is a group of girls who have never complained of any wrist pain, of course!

Anyway, I finally did go over it with them, and how to be responsible for the rice.  Since then, the novelty's worn off a bit, of course.  But the young ones are my eyes.  They've been policing and ratting out anyone who spills rice.  Especially when it's the boys.  Such tattle tales!

 List of exercises on the bucket:

1.  10 rice grabs (warm-up):  Grab and release rice on top
2. Grab & squeeze (20 sec):  Fingers wide, jam hands deep into bucket
3. Flexion & extension (20 sec):  Make fists, front to back wrist flexion & extension
4. Radioulnar deviation (20 sec):  Make fists, movement in radial & ulnar deviation
5. ABCs (20-30 sec):  Fingers together in fist or straight, trace abcs (Variety:  capital, lower case, cursive); or write poem or paragraph.
6. Circle in (20 sec):  Make fists, circle
7. Circle out (20 sec):  Make fists and circle
8. Grab & rotate (20 sec):  Make fists grabbing and releasing rice & supinate (rotate outward)
9. Grab & rotate (20 sec):  Make fists grabbing & releasing rice while pronating (rotate inward)
10. Rice grabs (20 sec):  Grab & release surface of the rice
11. Finger extensions (20 sec):  Pinch fingers together then extend out wide
12. Straight finger pinch (20 sec):  Keep fingers straight, open and pinch together on surface
13. Grab & squeeze (10 x 2 sec):  grab rice in hand above bucket and squeeze tightly then release
14. Fast grabs (20 sec):  On surface, grab rice and release as quickly as you can, like a sprint
15. Ruler resistance (20 sec):  Grab ruler in bucket, rotate wrists

I've been doing this list, myself; and by the 7th exercise in succession, my forearms feel ballooned out like I just ate a can of spinach (my dad apparently, when he was a little boy, thought spinach gave you Popeye forearms). 

I got at least half of the exercises from this video:

Inching Inchworms on Beam

Girls were five minutes early on beam, and we only had one available until the previous rotation ended; so I kept the new fives busy with this:

Technique for connected front tumbling

World's biggest rip?

Probably not.  But...

Que the gross-out factor:

Post by Greg Roe Trampoline GRT.

More core and shaping drills with instability devices

I might have posted this before:

Played around with other variations yesterday:

Sunday Funnies

Source

Some core & shaping exercises

Like a Girl

Hat tip:  GymnasticsCoaching.com

Origami Gymnast Folding Under Pressure on PBars

2-26-2015
Gymnast on Pbars
Designed by Luigi Leonardi (Italy)
Folded by Michael Sanders
Diagram source: OUSA Convention book '95

Rice Time

Sunday Funnies

Source