Coaches Landing shapes for back tumbling

[Geoffrey Taucer]

I had a regrettably brief discussion with Mike Lynch about this at a recent clinic, and I wanted to see what you all think.

When transitioning into a backhandspring out of either a roundoff, a backhandspring, or a whip, what is the ideal landing position?

What Mike was saying (and hopefully I'm paraphrasing his perspective accurately): The goal is to generate maximum power with minimum movement. Therefore, the head should be neutral with the body as close as possible to vertical. Arms by the ears reaching towards the ceiling. This allows for a very rapid rebound into the next skill.

My thoughts: I tend to prefer an exaggerated round shape (I've called it a "candy cane" or "question mark" shape), with the chin on the chest, eyes on the floor, knees slightly bent. Arms by ears, but with the head forward, this means the arms are reaching towards the wall, not the ceiling. The transition is not a punch or rebound, but rather a jump, delayed slightly after landing in order to allow the center of mass to pass farther over the feet, facilitating a relatively flat entry into the next skill. The idea behind the exaggerated hollow is to shorten the body which, again, allows the center of mass to pass farther over the feet before taking off for the next skill.

Obviously, this is for connecting into another backhandspring, and the technique would be very different heading into a salto.

So, what think you all? Straight-ish, vertical landing and fast rebound, or round-back landing with the head down, and slightly delayed takeoff?

 

[Deleted member D3987]

Mike is CRAZY intelligent. and you're both right. these adjustments you're speaking of would be dependent on the body type in my book. no 2 gymnasts are alike. tweaking is essential to what we do with our minds eye.

 

[CoachTodd]

Dunno stole most of my answer. I agree it all depends on the shape and strength of the gymnast. The stiffies seem to need to land already falling back with the arms pulling back to keep from going too high for a second handspring. I'm not sure about jumping between moving skills. Maybe I'm just misinterpreting that one. I look at it as more of a bounce. Not technically a punch and not really a jump either.

 

[BlairBob]

Ahh, Mike. It was great working and talking with him last year.

Some of what I gathered was it depended as has been stated above by each gymnast. Height and size and physical strength to hold positions and the power they can generate and thus the angles and reaction time.

 

[iwannacoach]

Therefore, the head should be neutral with the body as close as possible to vertical. Arms by the ears reaching towards the ceiling. This allows for a very rapid rebound into the next skill.

This is a great model to work toward as it eliminates a lot of work in the sense that few parts need to move relative to the other parts. For example...... The chin down tweak means that the gymnast must either do their round off wth their chin tucked in or work to tuck the chin during the snap down. The next phase of the skill will require their head moves to neutral, so why tuck the chin in (work) just to return it to neutral (work). That makes two working movements as opposed to Mike's model which requires no working movements through that same phase of the skill.

The arm position is another example. A gymnast's arms are in this position during the handstand phase of the round off. Getting into the candy cane shape requires a movement toward the hips followed by a second movement away from the hips....... with the added burden of having to move through a 65-80 degree arc instead of none at all.

Reconsider what you took away from your conversation with Mike in the sense that he's encouraging the body into the next phase of the skill and reducing movements that take hundredths of second to perform, and those hundredths add up to slow a tumbler down.

I get that the positions you're describing in your model feel like they produce more power because you feel these parts working to contribute to the skill, and they do. The only conflict is that you have do do more work (and that's what you feel) because you've placed yourself into a position that requires work to get out of. It feel that way because it's harder, not faster, and not more powerful.

 

[BlairBob]

^^^ Exactly. Mike was against the commonly used snapping the arms down on a rebound to shorten the body length in back tumbling.

However with a taller bigger gymnast you're going to get at a point that it just becomes difficult due to leverage and mass.

 

[Geoffrey Taucer]

Loving the feedback so far.

Some further thoughts; it seems to me that a more vertical landing, putting the center of mass higher, would generate greater angular momentum but less linear momentum. Conversely, the candy-cane shape would generate greater linear momentum, but less angular momentum. So the vertical technique would produced a slightly shorter but faster backhandspring, and the rounded technique would produce a longer, lower backhandspring.

That sound about right?

(I've generally favored very long, low back handpsrings)

And yes, Mike's a genius. I go out of my way to talk technique with him at every opportunity.

 

[iwannacoach]

it seems to me that a more vertical landing, putting the center of mass higher, would generate greater angular momentum but less linear momentum.

So let's say the run is the linear energy and Mikes model requires less linear energy to perform. This is based on the consistent, gradual "down hill" path the skill's center of mass falls down as the ro bhs progresses.

Take a stick and lean it 10 degrees away from you. If you let it fall away from you the pull of gravity will do one thing.... make the stick move exponentially faster relative to time. Part of the motion the stick experiences ends up being linear, and it comes about with no muscular effort as well as accellerating the (tumblers) with no muscular energy required other the the correct amount of support through the skills base (legs).

Gravity is a forc you can fight or use. Mike's model comes closer to using it than the popuar "curve whip" manipulation you're talking about.