Anon Order of kids for events

[Anonymous Post]

So, I’m curious...I’ve heard that the athletes are typically lined up and compete from worst to best. So, if my daughter is the worst on an event, she would go first and if she was the best she would go last. This seemed to be the case at her last gym but not so much at her current gym. Is this how coaches typically line up kids up and how judges know to expect better routines at the end or is this just something that I heard that may or may not be true.

 

[Anonymous Post]

In our area this is the case about 50% of the time. Our gym will put the kids needing spots or are missing skills first, but from there it could be any order.

 

[Anonymous Post]

The only time I have heard this is with college teams. For JO/Excel etc, I have never heard coaches doing anything like that. In college the thought process is that scores are already so inflated if you have your "lesser" athletes up first then the judges set an arbitrary floor and so scores can only go up as the better athletes go. Since JO is never really focused on team scores and you may often have the team split in different age groups, that approach really doesn't come into play. Lets see what others say?

 

[Anonymous Post]

I have never heard of this in DP or Xcel. We compete however works best for the athletes. There are usually a few girls who thrive on being first, and others who compete best last. If someone struggling with a skill insists they must be third to succeed...third it usually is.

If no one has specific requests, we do it by setting on vault or bars. So often small first and then tall. Occasionally if multiple girls need spots on the same skill (like a flyaway) they might compete together, but I have never seen (or approve of) lining the kids up worst to best Sounds like a big motive killer to me.

 

[Anonymous Post]

Sometimes we do try to build scores, but it depends on how the meet is going. If we notice that scores are tending to rise as the rotation goes on, then yeah, we will try to build on that. On beam, we do always try to put someone we think will hit up first to build confidence for the team. And one time we were following an excellent team on floor and doing warm ups in between, so we put our best right after their last one, and she did get our highest score of the day (and also won floor by 0.05 over the person she had followed). Most of the time, we ask for a volunteer to go first on each event and then, at least with silvers, try to have them follow the same person on each event. Our golds have four different vault settings though, so at least on vault, we go by setting, typically low to high. If we have someone who really struggles with an event, we will often actually put them last so that their shakiness doesn't effect everyone else. And once in a blue moon, we let the kids pick the line ups all the way through - that doesn't even happen every season though.

 

[Aussie_coach]

Not necessarily. In Australia most of the time we have no choice of the order of our gymnasts. We submit the names and they competition is arranged in a random drawer.

The way they do it regardless, is that on the first rotation the gymnast go in the order, on the 2nd apparatus the person who was 1st goes last and they go in order from the 2nd on the list, then 3rd apparatus from the 3rd on the list and so on.

If there is a choice coaches will often choose a very solid athlete to go first. Someone who tends to stick, it builds everyone’s confidence if the first routine is solid.

 

[pt coach]

I mostly am responsible for beam and floor competition orders. I like to start with someone who I am pretty confident will stick beam and I like to start with a fun and engaging floor routine. I used to go way beyond this plan and would try to be very strategic with my orders. I would carefully consider them the night before the meet etc. I spent way too much time on something that really made no difference at all. The judges have to judge each routine regardless of where the routine appears in the lineup. Now I just do random things - like I might ask the seniors in high school where they would like to compete in the order. If we have name cards to put in order and turn in to the judges, I like to have the kids pick cards to determine the order. Sometimes I ask for volunteers to go first, or last.

 

[ReluctantGymMom]

Our beam coach puts most consistent to least consistent as an order. Our bar coach puts highest scoring to lowest scoring. Sometimes they just ask who wants to go first. Vault is by table height usually

 

[gymgal]

Not necessarily. In Australia most of the time we have no choice of the order of our gymnasts. We submit the names and they competition is arranged in a random drawer.

The way they do it regardless, is that on the first rotation the gymnast go in the order, on the 2nd apparatus the person who was 1st goes last and they go in order from the 2nd on the list, then 3rd apparatus from the 3rd on the list and so on.

If there is a choice coaches will often choose a very solid athlete to go first. Someone who tends to stick, it builds everyone’s confidence if the first routine is solid.

We went to many meets similar to this. Session sheets were often pre-printed with the names already set for competition order. The order would remain the same but rotate 3 or 4 down for each next event. For example. VT: ABCDEFGH, Bars: CDEFGHAB, and so on.

 

[Anonymous Post]

Our coaches do seem to put the girls up lower scorers to higher scorers on each event. Lots of other factors can go into it too though like bar and vault settings or how warm ups went. The scores don’t always escalate though. I should add that my DD has only done compulsories and I’m sure the judges are very familiar with the routines. I can’t imagine our coaches ever letting the gymnasts decide the order!

 

[KIPSOG]

Our coaches generally let us choose our own order, unless we have different settings on vault or bars. We have small team, so it's pretty easy to do. For example, I always like to go first on beam because the longer I wait to compete the more nervous I get.

 

[Anonymous Post]

Vault: grouped by table settings & tsuk/yurchenko (for optionals)

Bars: how warmups went (girls that may fall on a skill go last - falling is contagious) and a few girls insist on what order they do best. Some girls want to go first and get it over with.

Beam: start with girls that usually don’t fall - (again, falling is very contagious on our team)

Floor: the girls pretty much know their order, ending with the strongest. The coach doesn’t want to highlight a girl that’s not as crisp by putting her immediately after a girl who hits every element sharply. She also tries to alternate the music style so it doesn’t get boring.

 

[Anonymous Post]

At the lower levels it tended to be lower score to higher score with some small variations but now in optionals not necessarily. They do like to put consistent people in certain early spots to give later girls confidence. Bar and Vault settings come into play. Our groups compete on one of two bar settings so they do warm ups and competing order in groups according to bar setting. Same with vault.

 

[Anonymous Post]

This is so interesting to me! I never thought much about this - in fact, I thought the meet gave the coaches the order. I'm still somewhat of a newbie though.

 

[Anonymous Post]

This is so interesting to me! I never thought much about this - in fact, I thought the meet gave the coaches the order. I'm still somewhat of a newbie though.

I know in Australia, the meet selects the order.

 

[Anonymous Post]

This is so interesting to me! I never thought much about this - in fact, I thought the meet gave the coaches the order. I'm still somewhat of a newbie though.

I only found out the first time when the coach mentioned to me (in level 3) that she’s going to change my daughter’s beam order to make sure she goes after a rightly like her so she doesn’t get confused (she started on the wrong side and ran out of beam).

Some of the new parents on our optionals team were shocked at the first meet when the order changed each event because at the gym they came from, the girls competed each event in the same exact rotation.

In State/Regionals/etc, the meet order is determined by the meet director or some other powers that be since they don’t compete together as a team.

 

[gymgal]

This is so interesting to me! I never thought much about this - in fact, I thought the meet gave the coaches the order. I'm still somewhat of a newbie though.

There are meets where this happens and the coaches are not allowed to change the order. Just depends.