Parents Post competition debrief

[Gym_momma]

After a competition, what does your gym do? We've seen scores for all apparatus but curious if other gyms do some type of debrief or modified training to address shortfalls? Or is it practice as usual?

 

[gym_dad32608]

Are you talking immediately after the meet? or back at the home gym? Immediately after the meet, the coach has the girls line-up and she usually reviews the competition, like "we looked focused out there", or "we need to work on landings for state" etc. In the home gym, its pretty much practice as usual. I dont think coaches like to change things too much in the middle of season.

 

[ORgymmom]

Practice as usual. Drives my daughter crazy and it mystifies me- there’s no feedback when things go badly and no acknowledgement when they go well. I’ve always wondered if that’s normal so I hope others chime in.

 

[mezzamare]

We had a meet this past weekend that didn't go all that great, and the girls got a hefty upgrade in conditioning intensity come Monday. Coincidence? Who knows.

 

[GymnastMomX2]

They line them up and talk to them immediately post-meet, but that’s it. Then it’s practice as usual.

 

[JBS]

After a competition, what does your gym do? We've seen scores for all apparatus but curious if other gyms do some type of debrief or modified training to address shortfalls? Or is it practice as usual?

Depends on the level... we have chats with our L9/10 kids about things that happen at meets sometimes. However... this is rarely about physical gymnastics... it is usually more on the mental side. Trying to help them connect with their training.

As far as shortfalls... we work on "problem areas" all the time. This may not be what you saw at the meet though. If the athlete has an issue with "Skill A"... but fell on their good skill... "Skill B"... we may still be working on "Skill A" even though they hit it in the competition.

The lower levels... practice as usual... for the most part... we do talk in line up sometimes about the meets.

 

[CuriousCate]

Practice as usual, but upgrades stop for the most part. I think that perhaps for our schedule, the meets come too quickly one after the other early in the season to really make any solid changes. They really just practice skills they already knew might be troublesome based on practices, not based on meet performance though. They seem to focus more on "ok, here is what we need to really make happen for you for the next meet" between our 4th and 5th meets in prep for states.

There are 5 regular season meets:
meet 1 - [2 weeks in between but with the way the sessions were scheduled, really ends up only being 7 practices in between] - meet 2 - [1 week in between but again only 3 practices due to session schedules!] - meet 3 - [2 full weeks in between] - meet 4 - [3 weeks] - meet 5 - [just under 2 weeks] - state meet

I think they plan it this way to get the kiddos a good sense of where they stand early on with some extra time to "fix things" in the 2nd half of the season to do well post-season.

 

[GymDad00]

Personally I think they should spend Mondays after a meet reviewing videos and scores of prior meets and have an open discussion about what needs improved upon. Or course that doesn’t happen. Just vague critics like.. do better, work harder. As if these 9–11 year old optional gymnasts training 20+ hours a week aren’t working hard and trying to do better already.

 

[CuriousCate]

Personally I think they should spend Mondays after a meet reviewing videos and scores of prior meets and have an open discussion about what needs improved upon. Or course that doesn’t happen. Just vague critics like.. do better, work harder. As if these 9–11 year old optional gymnasts training 20+ hours a week aren’t working hard and trying to do better already.

I think they likely say a lot of this stuff to the kids at the meet itself or during the practices without relating it directly to the specific performance at one meet. I always feel like my kids seem to know what they need to be working on without a review of the meet at practice. Meanwhile, because I don't really understand the details, I often want to have a meet recap!

 

[GymnastMomX2]

Personally I think they should spend Mondays after a meet reviewing videos and scores of prior meets and have an open discussion about what needs improved upon. Or course that doesn’t happen. Just vague critics like.. do better, work harder. As if these 9–11 year old optional gymnasts training 20+ hours a week aren’t working hard and trying to do better already.

Ooof, maybe a coach can correct me if I'm off base, but this seems like a MASSIVE waste of time. Can you imagine how long that would take to re-watch and critique all routines?

I trust that the coaches are focusing in practice on what needs work regardless of what happened during the small timeframe that a meet takes place. For example, my daughter had a fluke fall on her dismount on bars at her meet the other day, she never falls at practice, theres no point in the coaches spending time on that error. They are continuing to work on whatever it was they were before the meet.

 

[Pineapple_Lump]

Errors get fixed in the gym. No point going over them and pointing out all the negatives at the end of a meet - especially for younger athletes who will likely forget or just dwell on the one negative thing you said. Maybe a quick pep talk at the end, I might mention we will work on something in the gym to be better prepared if the mood is down. I want my athletes to leave the meet happy and motivated and hopefully confident - not hyper fixated on mistakes.

If there was a significant error or the athlete was upset at any point, a short discussion to explain the plan moving forward would have taken place immediately.

It's generally practice as normal with extra focus on any issues.

 

[GymDad00]

I don’t think you should focus on falls and obvious mistakes post meet. But specifically pointing out visually where they got their deductions can be very helpful and some kids are visual learners. Think of it this way NFL players review tape every Monday and screen game footage and strategize how to fix a problem.

I’m not saying devote a whole practice to it… but I’ve heard our coach’s express being baffled at a low score at times. No offense, but no coach is remembering exactly what deductions all his team got in a meet without reviewing routines.

Giving these kids a one hour review of their routines from a meet is hardly a massive waste of time in my opinion. Coaches may even see things they missed in the heat of the meet.

Some gyms post all their kids routines on YouTube with scores. They do very well and I’m sure they are reviewing those routines and improving by reviewing them as a team.

 

[JBS]

Think of it this way NFL players review tape every Monday and screen game footage and strategize how to fix a problem.

It's really not like that.

First of all... the NFL is dealing with all top notch (adult) athletes. So do I do this with my L10's... yes... for sure. But while the NFL teams review video... and study it before the game as well... most of the Pop Warner teams do not.

Secondly... imagine a football team running the same exact play every single play and the defense reacting the same exact way every play for the entire season... this is gymnastics. We see the routine hundreds of times before competition season has even begun. Our upper level gymnasts video themselves all the time and watch their routines and skills.

I’m not saying devote a whole practice to it… but I’ve heard our coach’s express being baffled at a low score at times. No offense, but no coach is remembering exactly what deductions all his team got in a meet without reviewing routines.

This is not as hard as you may think as we have seen every athlete do their routines many many times.

 

[Dahlialover]

The coaches and the athletes sit down and have a big talk at practice after a meet and I have no idea what they talk about! They are always prioritizing the skills that most of the team struggles with, so that doesn’t change.

 

[WV Gym Mom]

A quick chat directly after the meet prior to awards, but thats about it. This time of year, there are so many meets for us that there isn't really time in between to modify. We have three meets in february then one more in March right before state meet, so unless there is a specific issue (mental block, injury, etc) there aren't going to be adjustments to routines or changes in practice. Now, after the state meet its full steam ahead on change/upgrades/problem area focus.

 

[AmiaRay]

Practice as usual, with a little more focus on our shortfalls. When I have girls on beam the day after a meet, we do extra reps of the skills that they fell/had major issues on. If one event was a struggle for a whole level, we’ll try to get them there more often.

 

[LCsMom]

After a competition, what does your gym do? We've seen scores for all apparatus but curious if other gyms do some type of debrief or modified training to address shortfalls? Or is it practice as usual?

As a team they congratulate each other and share positive stories, then they get back to practice. For individuals, we have a coach who is a good videographer and he will break down a competition routine in slo-mo with key points stopped to show where the kid might be getting deductions. It helps my kid a lot (and me, for that matter--I am so impressed with judges who can see all those things in milliseconds).

 

[gymnast23]

After a competition, what does your gym do? We've seen scores for all apparatus but curious if other gyms do some type of debrief or modified training to address shortfalls? Or is it practice as usual?

For us, our practice goes how our meet went. our meet went good, our practice will go good. For beam specifically, if you get a 9.5 or higher, you are required to do one completely stuck routine before you can work next level. 9.25-9.4, you have 2 suck routines then work next level. 9.0-9.25, you have 5 skills stuck in a row if you wobbled on them then 3 routines. 8.5-9.00, you have 10 stuck skills you fell on (which we all assume you fall if you get a 9 or lower on beam) in a row then 5 completely stuck routines. if you get anything lower, it’s 10 routines with the other assignments. if we have a meet the next weekend, we strictly work routines. if we have a one week break or more, we work next level (depending on your scores) for how many weeks until next meet week. We did have this one beam rule where if you fell on a skill, you had a 100 stuck of that same skill. We technically still have that skill, but we also haven’t really had any falls, (besides me. i haven’t made a meet yet w/o falling). but luckily i get to skip the 100.