Gymnasts + Origami = Gymnagami...or is it "Origamnastics"? "Origymnami"?

Hanging out with a few of my favorite people last Saturday. Click on the photo for more.

LA Lights Holiday Invitational 2008 (Level 4s)

These are Ita's pre-team girls, plus the developmental level 4's who moved up over the summer (Emma, Sofie, and Grace came out of our SMGC intermediates/LASG advanced class). It was their first meet, and they did really well.

Grace is so shy, it's amazing to see her actually out there competing and performing. When she was with me, I had the darn'dest time getting her to remember anything resembling even parts of a routine. Strong and talented kid; but her habit and nature is more to do this all day long:

She always said she wanted to move up to team; but I think that was to be around Brenda and Keli, two older team girls. A strong kid with good-looking backhandsprings almost immediately, Hamest invited her to be on team earlier in the year. Mulan went, but Grace wasn't mentally ready. But around summer, she actually became serious about it.

Grace first came to SMGC from Broadway during summer camp in 2007. She hated being pushed in her stretching, and they did that a lot at Broadway; they do that a lot at LASG too, but she can take it now.

Grace:



I've known Emma since she was 6 or 7; she took a break, then came back a couple of years later. Another very strong, talented kid. Rather fearless on bars (she made my heart drop when she said, "hey look Michael", then did a mill circle on the high bar), she could do pullovers from the high bar right away, and started making kips prior to summer. Sloppy as all heck, you'd never recognize her now after only a couple of months on team.

Emma:




Sofie was with us at SMGC for quite some time as well. It's gratifying to see that she's hung in there and made it to team. I'm always happy when any of our gymnasts make that big transition to the world of competitive artistic gymnastics.

She had her round-off backhandspring on floor before moving up to team, but somehow lost it. I thought that maybe she had gotten sloppy on them, so that the coaches told her not to do it. But that's not the case. Sofie told me she lost it.

I'm sure it's still there, somewhere....

Sofie:




I've always liked Gracie. She and her sister Janie came to SMGC during summer camp in 2007 and had a great time. I thought we'd gain them in the Fall, but they returned to JAGS. When SMGC closed down, they came looking for us, and arrived at LASG. She went straight into Ita's pre-team class, tried rhythmic, then in the Fall, returned back to artistic.

Gracie:




Alejandra picked a very tough sport for her. But her love for the sport has made her determined not to give up. Through hardwork and perseverence she's made it to level 4 team. She has come a really, really long way in just a few months. She went from someone whose feet barely left the ground more than a couple of inches in a backhandspring, to someone who got her round-off backhandspring and has even done some standing ones.

Alejandra:




Tatiana's on pre-team with Ita, but comes on the days that I don't help Ita with her pre-team class. I always see her and her father around, though.


Tatiana:



Alexa's the kind of girl that boldly holds her head high and tells the world, "I'm beautiful, and people love me!" Really, thre's no lack of self-esteem in her bearing. She acts like she's in a beauty pageant. You can see it in her glance as she's walking out to do her floor routine.

Alexa:



Sarah's undoubtedly Ita's top student. She's so talented....she had never done a back flip on trampoline before, and within five minutes was doing them by herself with a very nice tuck. The team really wants her.

Sarah:



The "A-Team":



They were minus Miriam, who injured her ankle earlier in the week. They were on their own rotation, and I missed much of their routines as I was shadowing the "B-team" and pre-team girls.

Levels 5-9 also competed, and if I get around to it, I'll put their routines up as well.

Level 4 Floor Example

For my advanced girls, here's random video of Veronica during a private with Hamest, today.



*Update* October 12, 2008 Sunday

Here is Alejandra during a private with Ita. Alejandra was moved up to level 4 team over the summer and worked hard to bring her skill level up to speed. She wins the "most improved award", in my book:



She struggled for soooo long to get her backhandspring. and here she is doing her round-off backhandspring on floor.
Use these as a rough template of the floor routine.

LASG Academy Meet

3 hours of organized chaos is how I'd describe it. I guess it wasn't that bad, but it would have been nice to have been given more directive. As it was, I was only one step above the kids in not being totally confused and lost.

I only took a few clips. Leah Totsubo was my one beginning/intermediate Saturday kid who was nervous about the Academy meet, yet was willing to follow through with this. She only comes on Saturdays, and didn't really learn the routines until yesterday! So she was understandably in an emotional rollercoaster ride when I started to teach her the level 3 routine. She had been on-and-off crying, but started to feel better from the security of familiarizing herself with the routine. But then Ita convinced me that the special routine she had prepared for kids at Leah's level (Leah's actually a bit more advanced than the skill level within the routine) would be easier to acquire, as well as the fact that other kids were doing it. So I traumatized Leah all over again into tears as she had to relearn her floor with Ita, a teacher she hadn't worked with before.

Leah's older sister is in the advanced class after, and I held Leah over her class time to allow her a bit more practice while Heather directed the advanced girls.

Leah was still nervous, but I think seeing how so many girls were out there flubbing their routines yet walking away, still alive, put her a bit at ease.

Her parents let Leah know that the backdoor was open to her, to walk out; that she didn't have to do this. Her mom told me after the meet, that Leah said she had to do this for me. That makes me feel a little bad, that Leah might have felt she'd be letting me down, by not participating.



She did fine, and at the end of the day, she was all smiles with her medal- and much richer and stronger for the experience of participation.


I finally pulled my camera out when Alejandra stepped out to do her floor routine. All the other intermediate girls had done the special routine; and gone up, 4 at a time. Alejandra performed the level 3 floor and had the whole stage to herself.



Even though she made a couple of mistakes, I was duly impressed by what she cleaned up and polished on her own, from our last private together on Friday. It was very noticeable to me, that she did her homework.

When Hannah arrived, her mom told me that Hannah wanted to make sure that I was going to be the one out there helping her with her round-off backhandspring. It was very sweet. She really doesn't need help with it anymore.


I will ween her off, this week.


Emma Shapland's bar routine should appear below, when the upload is done:

She actually had better form here, than usual. So at least she is aware of it. I do not know why she asked for a spot on the single-leg shoot-through.

Alejandra in a 4 hour private!

Alejandra really wants to be a gymnast. She goes to UCLA meets and is "into it".

LASG has their annual "fun meet" this Sunday, which gives Academy kids a chance to show off what they've been working on for their family; and also gives them a taste of what it feels like to perform/compete in a gymnastics meet.

This poor kid has missed quite a few classes for the last two weeks, due to the flu. Her mom was worried that she might still be weak, but Alejandra- who missed Monday class and a scheduled private, begged to come today.

Alejandra began her day with Spring Camp- from 9:30am to 12pm. At 12pm, I arrived for an open-ended private. I thought we might go an hour or two. We ended up doing a 4 hour private, with only a five minute break for an energy bar.

Alejandra had never worked on the level 3 floor routine at all. The only skill in the routine she cannot yet perform is the bridge kickover. Other than that, she just needs to keep getting stronger in her handstands, body shapes, body tightness. Her handstand forward rolls need to get stronger, as well as her backward rolls.

For someone who hasn't worked much in the way of dance elements, she did pretty well. She has a certain knack for presentation, and I think that comes from watching and paying attention to good gymnastics on tv. Something that I found lacking in a lot of my SMGC students, including the team girls (many even have trouble identifying and labeling skills, let alone recognizing gymnastics celebrities and holding them up as sports heroes to emulate).

Anyway, after the 4 hour private "cram" session, Alejandra did her regular 4-5:30pm class! Good job Alejandra! Hope you get plenty of rest. Then it's back to practice, practice, practice!

03/28/08- Alejandra did a 2 hour private today. We added in vault, did some beam and did some floor. We decided to have her bridge down instead of candlestick to a bridge.




Good luck Alejandra!

Birthday Belle

Carol and I worked Alejandra DuBose's birthday party last December. I've had a difficult time figuring out what music to use in it, and how to edit it. I looked into Spanish music, but couldn't figure out what worked; I learned from Alejandra's school chum, Sierra, that Alejandra's big into Hello Kitty. Apparently "psycho big", although I've never seen any evidence of it; nevertheless, I searched YouTube for "Hello Kitty music". It does exist....and is painful to listen to. So forget that.

Since I left in quite a bit of the natural audio, I decided to go for instrumental versions of songs from Beauty and the Beast.




I didn't film everything we did at Alejandra's party (hard to film when you're also leading the party); but it gives some idea of what you could expect at an SMGC birthday party.

Even though this was a small party, Alejandra requested I build the mighty maze instead of the obscenely awesome obstacle course....so how could I refuse? I didn't film any of it; but I think we divided them into two teams and had a sort of relay race to see which team could finish getting through the labyrinth first.