WAG Giants

[gymisforeveryone]

I have a couple of girls who are learning their giants between the bars. They have had their single rail giants for more than a year, and strap bar giants for years. They straddle to pass the low bar because they are already quite tall (the taller one is 160 cm and the shorter one is 150 cm). They can't seem to get over to save their lives. We have done spotted giants (I have to stand on spotting blocks which makes the timing of the straddle and putting the legs together a little harder/scarier) and giants with an elastic band in place of the low bar. The taller one has been able to get over once with the elastic band but the shorter one can't even do that. They still sometimes struggle with the cast handstand to vertical so I make them first do one giant legs together and then put the band in place of the low bar for the second giant, when they try to do it straddled. They don't seem to be scared of the skill, they can safely fall and everything.

Do you have any magic words or tips to make them understand the tap better? Both are tapping too early, not staying in arch for long enough after passing the low bar and then ending up arching on the way up.

We do a lots of tap swings warming up for bars every day.

Because we are in Europe, they have to compete on FIG setting in every level. So putting the bars wider doesn't really fix the problem.

I can send a video for anyone willing to take a look.

 

[Jard.the.gymnast]

Can they do the straddled giants on the strap bar/single rail? Maybe put that elastic band with the strap bar, so they can focus completely on the right technique (since the strap bar giants are probably easier to them)?

Sometimes a little detaill can make it feel like an entire different skill, so drill, drill, drill

 

[_gym_wolf_]

I would take a step back and focus on drills that are specifically for timing of tapping. Do this for about 2 weeks (with little to no work on actual giants) or until the drills are more than perfect. Then have them try giants for a week. If it does not improve, repeat this pattern until the change is made (this worked for all the gymnasts at my gym)

 

[Annikins]

For my dd (who has just got her strap bar giants so I know it's not quite the same but it still might help!) the phrase that helped her was 'kick upwards' because if she kicked too early she would be kicking forwards, not upwards, so she could tell it was wrong. She had been trying to kick later for a few weeks but this was the 'magic' phrase that worked...good luck!

 

[jamieintexas]

Words help, I say push, arch, kick, but I stretch out the words to the exact amount of each action. If that doesn’t work I say other words until I find the magic ones for that gymnast.

 

[gymisforeveryone]

Can they do the straddled giants on the strap bar/single rail? Maybe put that elastic band with the strap bar, so they can focus completely on the right technique (since the strap bar giants are probably easier to them)?

Sometimes a little detaill can make it feel like an entire different skill, so drill, drill, drill

We have done this and they can do it better on strap bar. What I find difficult is placing the elastic band in right place, because our strap bar setting does not have low bar and the height is different. So the place of the elastic band is always a little bit different and there need to be two people holding the band...

For my dd (who has just got her strap bar giants so I know it's not quite the same but it still might help!) the phrase that helped her was 'kick upwards' because if she kicked too early she would be kicking forwards, not upwards, so she could tell it was wrong. She had been trying to kick later for a few weeks but this was the 'magic' phrase that worked...good luck!

I will try that wording!

Words help, I say push, arch, kick, but I stretch out the words to the exact amount of each action. If that doesn’t work I say other words until I find the magic ones for that gymnast.

I will try that too!

 

[Jard.the.gymnast]

We have done this and they can do it better on strap bar. What I find difficult is placing the elastic band in right place, because our strap bar setting does not have low bar and the height is different. So the place of the elastic band is always a little bit different and there need to be two people holding the band...

It is a lot of work, but you can replace a high bar with the strap bar and get out the low bar and replace it with an elastic band