Rescue Spotting

Jason Mortimer posted this video:




Not standing between the bars for your basic tap swing/counter swing during level 4/5 bars can result in the predictably unpredictable peel:





The following is a reprint of a post I wrote up on my other blog, from 7/12/2013:

Will she catch her Gienger release?  Or will her coach catch slow her fall?

Sometimes a gymnast will say, "Spot me." And when I do just that, get slightly perturbed when I didn't physically touch her.  "You didn't spot me!"  Ah, but I did.

 Great spotting is an art that takes practice.

There are several different kinds of spots.  Some involve actual physical manipulation on the part of the coach, essentially carrying the athlete through the correct pathway of the skill; others involve some physical guidance or assist on the part of the coach, but with the athlete doing most of the skill, herself; then there's a "shadow" spot, where the coach is there primarily as "moral support".  And should anything go tragically off course, there is "rescue" spotting.  This involves the spotter jumping in there to prevent a potential catastrophic injury from an unplanned fall.

This post focuses on the latter.

So how effective is actual rescue spotting?  What are the chances of a coach actually doing it?  Dr. Sands did a study on rescue spotting.  Here, he also defines different spotting purposes:

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A little sass with the brass

New Level 5 Compulsories

Vault:




Bars:



Beam:


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Hustled Out of a Dollar

Summer is often the time when we hope to intensify gymnastics training. Well, if you aren't working with elites and wannabe-elites, that's not likely to happen. So we often have kids who disappear for vacation trips, sometimes for weeks on end. You assign conditioning-on-the-go exercises they can do while away, and hope and pray they and their parents are disciplined enough to follow through with it.

One of my level 5's has been on vacation since the beginning of summer- almost 2 months. Monday was her first day working out and she could not do a kip on bars. Not even if her life depended upon it. She was very pouty and frustrated with herself.

Wednesday, she still could not make her kips. Wasn't even close to making it on the high bar. Lots of frowning and fuming. Then it struck me to inject some humor into it and I started picking on her over her orange toenail polish (anyone who really knows me, knows how much I hate nail polish, makeup, tattoos, and piercings of any kind- including earrings). I remember her toenails had this ugly orange on Monday as well. So I told her it was obvious she wasn't making her kips because she had ugly orange toenail polish on. I theorized, "I bet once you get rid of thatl polish, you'll be able to make your kip." A shocked, offended smile spread across her face. With feigned indignation, she denied the nail polish was the problem- especially her color choice. I insisted it was the polish. And the color. She boldly challenged me with a dollar bet that she could make the kip and prove me wrong. Based upon how much trouble she was having Monday and that particular succeeding Wednesday, I seriously did not think she had it in her to make the kip. So I took her bet.

She jumps to the high bar, long hang kips effortlessly. My jaw just dropped. her expression back was a smug, "I told you so!"


I think I got hustled out of a dollar.

Okay, so it wasn't the toenail polish....but they're still an ugly orange!!!

Gymnastics Meet at All Olympia

Talitha Gonna....."Backflip.....Cartwheel..."

Talitha's only 7 (at least in much of the footage, as she just turned 8 last month). Cute, playful, talented, she's a muscular dynamo.

Robyn's been giving me song suggestions, and this is one of them.

LA Lights Holiday Invitational 2008 (Level 5s and 6s)

Talitha:


Brooklin:


Nazeli:



Crislin:


Jesse:

Talitha and Ita on Spanish TV

Titulares Y Más, a Spanish-language late-night television talk and variety show aired by Telemundo, came to Los Angeles School of Gymnastics to film Coach Ita with 7 year old, level 5 gymnast Talitha Jones. It was filmed on a Monday morning at 5:30am; I believe it aired on July 4th of the same week, which would be a Friday.

"A little less conversation, a little more action, please..."

What do you get when you cross a chatterbox with a diligent worker? Juliaaaaaaa!

Julia transferred from Broadway (not the stage theater) to SMGC.....over a year ago? I'm sure she knows the date. I'm thinking end of 2006.



The first day, she was very quiet. I thought to myself, "Oh, great...we have a very focused, quiet worker with a singular purpose of getting better at gymnastics and epitomizing a productive work ethic. She'll be a good influence on the other girls." It took me about a month later to realize that first day or week or two, it was probably just the residual afterburn of several years at Broadway ("no talking!") and maybe some first-time jitters in a new gym. I guess it didn't take all that long for the other SMGC motor-mouths to break her in. (Incidentally, you can see her when she was about 10 yrs young and fresh onto Broadway team).

This video was about six months in the making. Julia actually is a very good worker (who happens to also balance it out with a lot of mouth-movement). She's one of my favorite people in the whole gym. Everyone seems to love her (even when they've never even met her- Juliaaaaa!). Who do we love the best?

Juuuuliaaaaa!!!!

Little Darlin'.....

It's been a long time since I made a video of Erin, even though she's been a mainstay (out of everyone who's left from SMGC, she's been around the longest) and someone who really appreciates these videos. I think the very first video I made was her doing level 5 beam, when I discovered Windows Movie Maker.

I've discovered that those I've known the longest are becoming the hardest to make videos for. The problem lies in an accumulation of video clips to sift through, as well as imperfect organization on my part. Sometimes, I don't know whether to store a clip under a person, or during a time period (summer camp, winter camp, etc) for easy retrieval.

Erin is a Beatles fan. She's also a very happy camper (I have always loved her laughter!) who likes happy songs. I'm already at work with her next videos (which should have more recent stuff).

This one waxes nostalgic like the last post. The part in the video where she doesn't really seem to be doing much of anything in her floor routine? That was some strange improv concoction she goofed around with.

The video is comprised of footage from 2004 and 2005...which is why she looks so small, cute, and fuzzy funny.

Well.....she still looks like that.....just a few years older.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Well....a day late, anyway. This video was conceived of at the end of practice last night. Something in my conversation with Kathryn got me to mention how I heard for the first time, the Moldy Peaches' "Anyone Else but You", as sung by the actors in the movie "Juno" (which I have not seen, and only vaguely know about- Kathryn and Hannah made it known to me that I've been living under a rock, and the movie and song are so old, people are sick of it now). So anyway, I like the song, and am not tired of listening to it yet. I suggested I should use the song in one of my videos. Then suggested Kathryn and Hannah- who are best buds since perhaps diaperhood- should sing or pretend to sing the song. I had seen a number of YouTube cover videos yesterday of people acoustically singing the tune and had found a version I like. (Plus, it's sung by sisters, which suits Hannah and Kathryn perfectly).

So this is a quick video edit, using a mish-mash of footage stretching back almost 3 years, up to what I filmed of them, yesterday.



It sounds like Kathryn will probably discontinue gymnastics when we make the move to LASG; and Hannah will be getting back surgery this year for scoliosis, all but effectively ending any ambitions for competitive gymnastics. I wish the two of them all the best of luck in their future endeavors!

They've left me with some pretty fond memories to cherish. I will miss them.

Level 5 Floor for Intermediates

Since SMGC does not compete level 4's, I have the intermediate classes work on elements from the level 5 routine; that way, if any of them make it to team, they'll have a sort of "head start". In terms of the dance elements being progressive, moving from basic to something more advanced, I don't see it. It's silly that prior to the second tumbling pass, what differentiates 5 from 6 is a flexed toe in 5 and a pointed toe in 6. That's just....pointless; other than to confuse transitioners, who end up jumbling parts from 5 with parts from 6.

I wonder how often a level 6 gymnast doesn't realize she has kept a level 5 interpretation in her routine, goes unnoticed and uncorrected by the coaches, and then makes its way before tired judges who, after watching a hundred routines, fails to catch the error.

Anyway, most of our intermediates only train once or twice a week, in two hour classes. They don't always get to practice routines; but some really get into it.

I thought I'd put some videos up of the routines; that way, we can spend more time polishing in class and less time memorizing.

Hopefully, they will also get a "feel" for the performance aspect, and see how different gymnasts and different gyms interpret the same routine differently.

The following video is of Michele Wunderlich during practice, April 4th:


This is a video I took of my friend's daughter, Nika (who I taught her first backhandspring to):



The routine scored a 9.1 or 9.2.

Here is a 9.6 routine at the So. Cal State Championships, by another Nica. Outstanding dive roll!

The following is of one of my adult clients. Mari only recently began working on the level 5 floor routine and her background in dance and movement shows through in this partial clip:




Here is her first time doing a round off backhandspring without a spotter present, on the floor. November 24th:



I encourage all of my intermediates to run "level 5 gymnastics" through the search function on YouTube. You can learn quite a bit from observation and study. In my day, I didn't have such access at my fingertips. I had to monitor the tv guide for any gymnastics on Wide World of Sports or other sports programs, and set the VCR. Now you are no longer limited by only watching elite level gymnastics on tv; but through the internet, we are able to peek in on home video training sessions of anything from high level gymnastics to awful low quality gymnastics.

(You're a Wonder) Wunder Woman

Michele Wunderlich is one of the funniest kids I know. Here she is in some of her glory:




The only thing funnier are the words that come out of her mouth.

The growls that she does toward the end of the video while on bars is because she was having a horrible time on her glide kips. Yuri had her start growling to put some "gambatte" heart and energetic aggression into how she was kipping. It helped, and she started making them.

"Out of the Blue"

Erica joined SMGC over the summer, having arrived from Vermont. Happily, she's made Los Angeles her home, now.

Having been out of gymnastics for a while, she signed up for our summer camp program. Erica had some demons to overcome. Having previously suffered a bad spill, her confidence was still shaken over a basic move: a round-off backhandspring.

Her struggles with her mental block and a recent song inspired me with the theme for this video. The song is written and performed by her coach, Lillian Carrico. I think it's a really good song, deserving of airplay and some notoriety for Lilly. She should be making albums (but only if she can still coach, too; because she's good at that, as well).

Level 5 Beam (obsolete compulsory)

This was one of my very earliest experiments; maybe my first video: