MAG Mens national teams and their original gyms

[J&A's mom]

I was thinking about how when girls change gyms, you hear all about it. Norah Flatley, McKayla Maroney, Kerri Strug, Vanessa Atler, Dominique Moceanu, etc. You hear about their old gym, and about their new gym.

Anyway, I was thinking about how most of the men change gyms because of going to college, and then how you basically don't hear about their old gym anymore. Like Sam Mikulak, he is from Michigan, but where was he before that?

How do the boys/men's compulsory coaches deal with this? Do they 'mind' not getting credit for their work? Is there ever any ill will about this?

Thinking about this makes me appreciate my son's coaches even more! They truly do have a thankless job to the general public....but I guess they have the thanks of the parents, which may be what keeps them going.

ps....I didn't know we needed to put in a prefix....we should really have an other, nothing really fit

 

[BlairBob]

It does happen, but I have never heard of families picking up and moving or sending their boys away like they do with girls in the US. Quite often, one gym may get a rep of being a good men's gym, and so often the smaller programs lose boys to them.

 

[CalEliteCoach]

Sam trained at Scat's in Hunington Beach, California. He has trained there 15 years, then went to college at Michigan. It doesn't happen often, but most boys will move from their starter gym and end up at a larger more productive program. The OTC in Colorado is set up just for that purpose.

 

[gymdog]

There tends to be less hard feelings about these things. It's just a different system anyway...male gymnasts generally peak later which has made certain NCAA programs national team feeders. Expectations are different.

 

[Deleted member D3987]

CalEliteCoach and Gymdog got it spot on.

 

[Geoffrey Taucer]

Honestly, I've found the men's gymnastics community to be generally more laid-back and less ego-driven than the women's gymnastics community.

And I'm not sure why that is. Perhaps it's a result of the higher profile that women's gymnastics has in the US compared to men's; perhaps it's because the fact that women peak earlier leads to more of a sense of urgency among coaches, gymnasts, and parents; perhaps it's just a series of coincidences.

I will say, though, that I'm finding the women's gymnastics community in NorCal to be far more laid-back than that of NC. (Especially the Raleigh area -- 10+ girls programs close enough to each other to compete for the same customers and coaches leads to WAAAY more drama than is healthy.)

...

(Can you tell I'm happy I moved?)

 

[BlairBob]

Well San Jose used to be more competitive say 5 years ago. A lot of the gyms have floundered or gone out of business. Your gym(s) are nearly the only game in town these days in that area besides Airborne and Champions.

I generally find MAG way less crazy than WAG though. And quite often the males are way less crazy than the females. They may be jerks but they aren't bat crazy. Especially when it comes to the Judges but that's because MAG has more crossover there.

 

[Deleted member D3987]

couldn't have said that better myself. ^^^ 2nd paragraph.