Improvised bounce bar in the hotel

Where would we be without Velcro?

Wade Petersen was mentioning to me about how he was thinking for a way to show square hips with posts sticking out the sides.  So I came up with this:


Also thought about maybe attaching flashlights or laser pointers to the sides (Al Luber used to talk to the kids about pretending like they had headlights).

And the bottom idea I had a couple of years ago and had bought the material but never executed the idea until this past week:

Round-off Turnover & developing a long backhandspring

Back handspring & round off drills for pike down technique

Handstand flatback drill

I got this idea originally from Swing Big:

Tumble Trak's new Therabands

At National Congress in San Jose, Trade Show. I ordered two rolls of two different grade resistance on these Tumble Trak therabands. They're made segmented with loops. It resolves having to tie knots. They ran out by the afternoon on the first day; so I ordered for delivery to the gym. I think they are so new, they don't even have them listed on their catalog. We'll see how well they work.  I'm worried about the loops being manufactured too big. 

I texted all our JO parents from the Trade Show and they are all in as far as reimbursing me for the bands and sticky toes (I managed to get a few coworkers to register and give me their buy-one-get-one-free coupons)- rather than convincing the gym to buy it, I convinced the parents to have their athletes own their own.

I also picked up a bar pad for $17 (all Tumble Trak products were also with a 15% discount) that fits between hands shoulder width apart on the bar.  Otherwise I would have soon made one myself. 

We have one kid who's been having so much trouble on giants, I am thinking of trying this drill with her:







That's from the Forster-Resnick Bar Boot Camp the first year they had it.  Tom included it in one of his lectures at Congress this weekend.

Vault idle stations circuits

Encouraging the Tap

Adductors & Abductors with Resistance Bands

Core Posture Alignment Awareness & Strengthening Exercise/Test

Hollow Push-Up Beam Crawls while Piggybacking Foam Block

Since we did not have all the beams, I thought I'd kill some time on the two high beams we did have with a little conditioning and concentration game. The Hot Shots loved it so much, we spent 2/3rds of our beam time on it. I figured they were getting stronger working their core and support strength. Since they were enthused about it, why not?

At first, they had trouble; then they started figuring out a certain "cheat"- foam block on the upperback and behind the head. I might have to create a rule on no resting the foam behind the neck; but if it helped them keep their round turtle back, I couldn't really complain.

Bungee bar candle levers

Finding body alignment on the foam rollers

All sorts of creative uses for foam rollers beyond the original intent.


Here's one:

Stinky Roundoffs

Our level 5s who just got done with compulsory season are going to try and jump right into the optional season as new 7s.  They aren't entirely ready and are still acquiring skills (*cough*giants*cough*); but they've definitely come a long way in a short time.

Last Saturday one of their return stations was round-off slams.  We once worked with putting a whoopie cushion up as a target a long time ago.  Decided to pull it back out and use it (I bought three of these, with two still functional).

I think the rec parents in the bleachers were greatly entertained.

Pac-man hollow arches

There are some other ideas for this I hadn't filmed, yet.

I wish my current gym had rainbows (half doughnuts).  I had filmed a couple of creative drills at my old gym using these; but I no longer have those vids.

Chin Pillows

Some brilliant ideas work better than others.  This was not one of them:

This is related to the "sticky toes".

Oh, well.  I think the concept is still good- just not the execution of it   I've also thought of experimenting with some sort of modified neck brace.





How about a strip of velcro attached from a mouthpiece to the front top of a leotard?  I kid.  (Actually, as I type this, I think I have a clip somewhere of kids putting the front of their leotard in their mouths to back extension roll and feel their head position).

Backhandspring Progress & Shaping Drill

We only have one vault table and I normally don't get to do this drill setup with my girls on a regular basis.  This was a preteam/new level 3 kid on Saturday.  She made some big improvements on her backhandspring.

Assisted Press Handstand Station

Jump Block Drill for High Bar

Jump blocking is pretty commonly seen on the low bar for low bar glide kip.

At a recent meet, one of my girls remarked seeing GymJam warming up with jump block for the high bar.  I didn't witness it myself, but thought that's an idea worth exploring.

For most of the girls in the video this is the first time they tried it (on the high bar):

Region 3 Congress Yurchenko Lecture- Steve Arkell