Full spin on beam deductions and all about GB WAG programmes

[Jenny]

This wasn't my dd competing. Although you are right, she is doing 15 hrs, but has only been on team about 18m so will be competing novice when she starts competing. In this region you move up to intermediate *if* you achieve a benchmark score. "Novice" is actually pretty tough, there were kids there doing bwo-bhs on beam and ro- bhs-lo on floor. I think it's generally deemed that if you only train once or twice a week you compete at floor and vault rather than wag. My child just happens to be caught in the middle as her strength is bars, and beam (except for the leaps :lol, so although not the most flexible or talented she doesn't want to do f+v,,but it's going to take a while for her dance and flexibility to catch up with her strength...

Those skills are level 7! That is pretty advanced for the term novice lol. The 180 split makes more sense a long side those skills. That is a high level to begin competing at. I was thinking novice = cartwheels and candlesticks! When will your dd get the chance to start competing and good luck to her. Keep stretching.

 

[Iwannabemargo]

In our County Novice doesn't allow saltos, any vaults higher than a handspring, or acro conections on beam, or cast to handstand.

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[Flossyduck]

Sorry Bog, my dd doesn't do novice so I can't shed any light on it. I'm finding the thread interesting because I have to say that I don't really know what novice is, I haven't come across it and if you'd asked me to guess I would never have guessed they worked that sort of skill level. I assumed it was, well, beginners as the name suggests?! DD went from beginner to development, then squad in a fairly short time and never competed as a rec gymnast. It sounds like a crazy mixed up system!

 

[bogwoppit]

Sorry Flossy I think I mixed you up with someone else. It is amazing the differences in Novice across the UK, both in skills and training hours. I agree that it is a very interesting thread. Thanks Faith for starting it. If any of you do not mind telling us your regions, though certainly not your clubs or hometowns, it would be interesting to understand how the differences match up. USAG seems uniform all over the 5o states, amazing the UK is so tiny and so different.

 

[Deleted member D3987]

i too am interested in this.

 

[Faith]

Sorry Bog, my dd doesn't do novice so I can't shed any light on it. I'm finding the thread interesting because I have to say that I don't really know what novice is, I haven't come across it and if you'd asked me to guess I would never have guessed they worked that sort of skill level. I assumed it was, well, beginners as the name suggests?! It sounds like a crazy mixed up system!

I was pretty shocked, to be honest, and very disheartened, both as a parent and on behalf of my daughter. She trains hard, and has come so far- you may remember I've said before 18 months ago she couldn't do a handstand, or a bridge kick over, no form and no apparatus skills at all. Now she has clean (old) USAG level 5/6/7 skills, with really good form and consistency. I see now why she hasn't been allowed to compete while they've focussed on up training...

The only difference between these kids and Elite track gymnasts as far as I could see was they perhaps didn't have quite the control or flexibility expected for the Range and Conditioning section. Having youtubed some videos the elite track girls are almost dancers, very flexible and beautiful to watch, naturally straight legs and pointed toes, together with the gymnastics skills. If you consider the big clubs like Liverpool, they only have 4 or 5 kids on the elite track for each year group, which must be a miniscule percentage of their overall talent pool. They also train 18 hours a week from age 6/7.

In our County Novice doesn't allow saltos, any vaults higher than a handspring, or acro conections on beam, or cast to handstand.

They don't allow flipping vaults, but I think half on/half off is allowed. Didn't see any though. Apparently there is a bonus for a backward giant on bars!! . Having looked everywhere I now see the small print where "FIG execution and artistry penalties will be applied", so Dunno is right, and my original beam question will be whatever the FIG rule is..

I can see why kids who don't want to do 12+ hours a week compete floor and vault. I don't think you could compete "novice" on less. The move up score is so high- out of the kids I saw the other week, only the top three or four scored out to intermediate....

It just seems a lot of hours and a lot of work for the local novice league.

ETa for those that don't know or are interested there was novice (minimum age 8+ in year of competition) intermediate (age 9+), advanced (10+), challenge (11+) then full FIG. It basically mirrors the elite track voluntaries.

 

[Iwannabemargo]

Novice is a very fluid term. As I posted what is allowed in county - we are however off to Wiltshire on Friday which is regional and its a whole new ball game. Whilst Pink and Fluffy is clocking up the medals in county I have no illusions that this weekend will be for the experience - not the hardwear ! It sounds like the comp you just had is like what we will be doing this weekend - based on Levels 5-1 - so again setting is everything. The last meet we attended in county was basically grade 14 stuff

 

[Iwannabemargo]

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[Flossyduck]

I wouldn't get disheartened Faith. In truth I don't think it matters which track most of the girls are on, as I (maybe naively) suspect that the destination will be the same in most cases. That is to say, many of them will get to the level they are capable of getting to if they stick with the sport - whether that's a quick and early burst with the elite track or over a bit more time. If you are in a decent club, with good coaching and have the passion, I can't see why any coach would hold someone back from where they could get to. It's just that they may need to work on them longer. It sounds as though the novice system allows girls to compete at a high level and that they must be training at a high level. I don't know what makes them decide some girls can go the elite route. It's incredibly tough and the burnout and injury rate is high and the girls have to be able to keep up with the skills, which they train at well beyond the level they are competing. Plenty of good gymnasts have done it the slower way and are successful. On the op. I'm not sure novice is a big thing around us. Our county has a floor and vault comp and a four piece, which is competed on levels - in or out of age. Some of the rec gymnasts go to a comp which involves a simple floor routine and squat through vault. That is classed as a novice comp. Any older, or with higher skills and they do grades out of age instead.

 

[Flossyduck]

Just to add. I was chatting with our HC a short while ago about one of the GB seniors who seems to get underscored. She mentioned some of the marking deductions in FIG, which penalise her because she is muscly and when she split jumps, the muscle takes a shave off the 180. She said that although it was a small deduction, if you have three jumps it adds up. As a result, good oversplits are essential to get the full marks. We discussed one of the very good rising young juniors (not at our gym), who did very well recently, but is a complete power house, with tonnes of muscle and not such great flexibility. She said that they are getting what they can out of her now, because they are worried she will struggle to be as successful at the next level. There was a lot of other insite too. It was quite an eye opener for me that they have to take the most minute details into consideration and some of the things they think about before deciding whether it's worth putting someone through the demands of the elite programme. She also said they are very aware of which girls are doing what in the other competitive groups and who has the potential to rise later and be successful longer term. It restored a lot of my faith in the coaches, if not the marking system!

 

[bogwoppit]

Faith if we had R&C in Canada a ton of girls wouldn't be anywhere near the national levels. I am always stunned by those sets and they certainly are not within the abilities of many gymnasts who otherwise could be great. I feel for your DD, it is very tough to be dealt with that way.

 

[bogwoppit]

Clearly novice is a term used to describe many different systems in a very small country. Confusing and perhaps not the best for conformity across a system.

 

[Learning Parent GB]

I'm In Lincolnshire, England. I've never come across the term novice. We have fun level 6 competitions and then allegedly it is a bit more serious from level 5 up. My DD has only ever done the one level 6 competition so the idea of regular competitions is new to me. From what I can gather we have floor and vault competitions early in the year, then the 4 piece competitions in the middle of the year - both by level and age group, and then towards the end of the year we have team competitions in level and not age. Our club don't do the regional grades at the moment and I have never heard mention of the range and conditioning. I've you tubed and had a look and it certainly looks hard on the strength and flexibility side compared with the level of moves in their routines. The only way I have heard of 'elite' as opposed to non-elite is to describe gymnasts doing level 5, 4, 3, 2, Espoir etc as opposed to the grades system. But then as you can do the levels out of age (DD is out of age as she will compete as a 9 year old) and have 14 year olds doing level 5 etc - so the use of the word elite is a bit confusing. I don't have a future Olympian on my hands so I try to just go with the flow and let her do everything she has the chance to do

 

[Gymmommy71]

My DD competed USAG L6 this year, and did that one time at a meet...turned, but instead of putting the foot that wasn't on the beam during the turn in front, it went behind...she got nailed on her score to the point that I think (not sure, I'm not a judge) she would have been better off doing it right and falling (like she got an 8.05 or 8.1 when the rest of the routine was really clean and no falls). Coach told me doing it that way is just like not doing the skill at all, plus there's dedcutions for misc. stuff. Maybe falling would have shaken her up more w/ the rest of her routine so it would have been worse, but still, it was a pretty big deduction IMO.

 

[Iwannabemargo]

Its funny you are surprised by the R&C element, actually this is the bit Pink and Fluffy excells at. Interestingly only one club in our County works levels, the others Do grades. The Competition we are off to on Friday is based on levels and we are competing out of age. Pink and fluffy suffers a bit with our system as she is an end of November birthday and so although only 9 is competeing as 10.

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[Learning Parent GB]

Its funny you are surprised by the R&C element, actually this is the bit Pink and Fluffy excells at. Interestingly only one club in our County works levels, the others Do grades. The Competition we are off to on Friday is based on levels and we are competing out of age. Pink and fluffy suffers a bit with our system as she is an end of November birthday and so although only 9 is competeing as 10.

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My DD has the wrong birthday for gymnastics too. She is 8 competing as 9. I was fortunate enough to plan my pregnancies to have children who were older in the school year - but I didn't know anything about gymnastics then I actually think that R&C is a good thing to set them up to be better gymnasts long term. And DD would love to have a go. She loves being stronger than her big brother and seeing her muscles develop. Here some clubs do both grades and levels and we had a clash of dates. Fortunately that meant the level 5 comp was moved back 6 weeks which gives DD 6 weeks much needed extra practice time.

 

[Flossyduck]

I think the R & C is amazing. Daughter asked me recently what my favourite skill of hers was and I made the mistake of telling the truth... I don't think anything will ever beat watching her straddle press up to handstand hold and down and back up and down several times, perfectly (usually) controlled. She was a bit put out that I wasn't gushing over somi's and giants and stuff, lol. I do think it sets them up well. They will use those skills on beam, bars and so on, in slightly differing forms. There were several girls at my school who could flic and somi and so on, but I never saw anyone in my life do a straddle press until my daughter started her current gym and the little girls were all lined up doing them. Still think it looks stunning and always will.

 

[Iwannabemargo]

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My DD has the wrong birthday for gymnastics too. She is 8 competing as 9. I was fortunate enough to plan my pregnancies to have children who were older in the school year - but I didn't know anything about gymnastics then I actually think that R&C is a good thing to set them up to be better gymnasts long term. And DD would love to have a go. She loves being stronger than her big brother and seeing her muscles develop. Here some clubs do both grades and levels and we had a clash of dates. Fortunately that meant the level 5 comp was moved back 6 weeks which gives DD 6 weeks much needed extra practice time.

Nighmare system isn't it - every other team sport uses the accademic year - so my eldest boy who is 20th August is at a huge disadvantage - I thought I'd done better with her .........

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[Jenny]

I think the R & C is amazing. Daughter asked me recently what my favourite skill of hers was and I made the mistake of telling the truth... I don't think anything will ever beat watching her straddle press up to handstand hold and down and back up and down several times, perfectly (usually) controlled. She was a bit put out that I wasn't gushing over somi's and giants and stuff, lol. I do think it sets them up well. They will use those skills on beam, bars and so on, in slightly differing forms. There were several girls at my school who could flic and somi and so on, but I never saw anyone in my life do a straddle press until my daughter started her current gym and the little girls were all lined up doing them. Still think it looks stunning and always will.

I think it looks stunning too. I am in awe of the girls like your dd and the TOPs girls who make it look so easy. It must be so exciting for her to have done so well at compulsory 4. It is not easy and not many girls make it. You must be so proud.

 

[Iwannabemargo]

It does seem to me that BG / local County organisations are a wee bit secretive about gym. When you start off the information available is only What your gym chooses to tell you.

Try and find out about the skills required for grades- or how the grading / levels system works. It takes some determined digging and some background knowledge.

When we first started we ddn't have a scooby !


That's why this site is so great - I have learned more here in a few months than in 7 years as a gym mums.

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