Gymnasts Level 8 Help

[Gymnasticslover193]

Hi I’m a gymnast and I would appreciate some help on some of my skills. I’m training level 8 and I have one more week (which is a gymnastics camp) before the coaches decide if I compete level 8 or level 7. Going into this I knew that competing level 8 wasn’t a certainty but now after training level 8 I know it would be heartbreaking to have to compete 7. So I guess the first thing that I need help with is being able to just cope with competing 7 if it does lead to that. On the skills side our gym requires us to compete a round off back tuck dismount however recently I’ve gotten a fear of my beam round off. I was training round off back tucks off of our beam that leads into the pit however when I tried to move it to a regular beam I missed my foot and bruised my elbow pretty badly. This happened a few weeks ago. Ever since then I’ve been scared of round offs on the high beam and even more terrified of round off back tuck dismounts and I have this week in order to at least get it back into the pit where it used to be. I would appreciate some tips to get over this fear and some round off/round off back tuck dismounts progressions. While this is definitely important and something my coaches will take into consideration when deciding my final level it’s more of a personal goal and not something the coaches have discussed about requiring from me.

The next two skills are much more important as they are my tumbling passes on floor which my coaches have said are very behind and I have this one week to make them better. Firstly I have my front layout front tuck pass. It’s getting a lot better and cleaner however I still sometimes have an issue with piking my front layout slightly, keeping my head back, and some form problems. My second and most important floor skill issue is in my back layout half which I have gotten a mental block on. I first started back twisting back in march and have had a back half since then. I’ve never been good at back twisting but my air awareness has been pretty good and I’ve always known exactly where I am in the air. However this past week my air awareness has completely disappeared and I keep getting lost. It all started when I did a back half on a trampoline at home which I am aware wasn’t a smart idea and I got lost and did a quarter instead l. I did like 3 more and they weren’t good but my air sense was fine. Then one day at practice my coaches told me to change my arm technique for my twists and the first time I did it I was very very lost. I got lost the second time too but the third time I was fine and actually landed it well. Then the next practice I was working on my back halves and still felt kind of lost but less so then the other day. One of my other coaches said my halves looked good however and I should try a full. When I did I felt even more lost though my coach said my fulls were ok and had proper technique. The practice after that I was back to working on halves but I felt myself getting very lost. One time I did a half and ended up doing a quarter. When I twisted I could see where I was and mentally knew where I was but it was as if my body didn’t know where it was in the air which midway through the twist made it so I mentally didn’t know where I was either. It felt scary and very unsafe. I told that to my coach and she told me to just work on layouts until I felt confident enough to twist again. I know that I need to get my back half better in this week but this mental block feels terrifying and really hard to get over so idk if I can. So what I really need right now are some tips to get over this mental block as it’s what’s really stopping and halting me.

 

[raenndrops]

For the RO-BT Dismount on beam ... take it back a few steps.
Line on the floor.
Floor beam.
Low beam with panel mats stacked up. Each time you feel comfortable with what you did, unfold one panel on each side at a time.
If you have a crank beam, that would be the next step. Crank it all the way down. Once you get it to 50% of competition height, move it on to the beam that dismounts into the pit.

For Floor:
FLO-FT and FP-FT are worth the same, so as long as you can still connect the tuck to the pike cleanly, then don't stress over that one. You can, of course, still work on it, but you don't need any extra stress.
For the back 1/2 or 1/1 ... have you had a recent growth spurt? Have you seen a doctor lately to get your ears looked at? Inner ear issues and growth spurts can both cause your issues (but so can other things ... like STRESS). You said they had you change your twisting technique. Does your gym have a tramp where you can work on the twisting technique on a "softer" surface?

Good Luck ... and if you have to compete L7, you will be fine.
As you get your skills more solid, maybe you could implement them into your L7 routines! One of our L7s a couple years ago, upgraded her passes early in the season to prep for the high school season because they use L8 rules (with high school bonus) in my state.

 

[Gymnasticslover193]

Oh ok thank you so much. Sadly we don’t have beams that crank but we normally stack stack eight inchers so as I get more comfortable I can just take them down.
Our gym is kind of strict and requires a front layout front tuck so I sadly wont be allowed to do a front tuck front pike unless they have me go to 7. We do have several twisting drills including one where you do a half to your stomach onto a pit pillow on one of our in ground tramps so until I get more comfortable twisting again I can work on the technique there.