Coaches Advice for Ectomorphic Types?

[gymjunkie]

We recently had a 10 year old L6 move to our program from another state. She's the most ectomophic gymnast I have ever coached. Parents say previous coaches didn't take her seriously at first, because of her skinny long arms and legs, but changed their tune when they saw how hard she tried. I see that too. For those who have had experience with this body type heading into optionals, I need some advice. She probably belongs in rhythmic more than artistic, but she isn't interested in rhythmic and is really good at bars and beam. She has beautiful body lines, but struggles to keep the flexibility under control. At first I thought she was not very strong. Now I realize she is strong, just not as strong as she really needs to be to control the excessive flexibility and extensive length of her limbs. She is more slow twitch than fast which is a big problem because she will need maximum speed to get those long limbs to rotate. She is not tall for her age, just proportioned very long and lean. She cannot vault to save her life, but we are making progress there. She's a good twister and has giants that are more technically perfect than you would expect from a kid who just learned them over the summer. Pilates has been suggested for her by a trainer who works with our team. What else works for kids like this? The rest of my team is more muscular, quicker and less flexible, so I will need to customize parts of the workout for her if she is going to make it into higher levels, something she is determined to do.

 

[Deleted member D3987]

rope, rope and more rope. extra bar conditioning. press handstands galore even if she can't do them perfectly. ugly is better than not if she can make them up repetitively.

you won't teach her a double back on floor. you'll teach her 2ble twists, 2 1/2 and triples. understand?

you'll work stalders and endos on bars. you'll do tkatchevs and jaegers.

skill selection will be very important. yurchenkos will be hard. hand fronts even more so. you may have to go back to handspring 2ble fulls.

 

[gymjunkie]

That's the direction I have been heading, so I appreciate the affirmation. So far, she keeps surpassing my expectations of what I think she can do and do well. I thought she would be the last one to learn a layout and she ended up being the first one to get her full. I know there are plenty of highly successful gymnasts with her build, I've just never had one before!