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[cp13]

My DD has been back for 3 practices. She didn't lose any skills. They aren't tumbling yet. She competed JO through L5 and last year competed Xcel Gold instead of Platinum because she struggled to get her B skills on floor and bars and also had some tumbling mental blocks. She struggled to get her cast handstand all of last year. Today during her 3rd practice back she got her cast handstand. She thinks maybe all of the press handstands during quarantine paid off.

 

[aerials]

So 4 practices in and she still has her FLO, giants, full and all of her beam skills. She is pretty happy.

 

[Greatlakesmom]

Well, I hate to type this, but practice #2 was a disaster for my older daughter. Right at the beginning of practice they were doing "lines" and she twisted BOTH of her ankles on bad landing doing C jump. She sat there, cried and iced her feet for the remainder of the practice, and then wobbled out of gym saying she has no more tears left. She is my emotional one... Every year since level 6 she gets hurt at least once a year, so she knows how it feels to be on sidelines. And to just come back from being out for 2.5 months and again be out so quickly is hard for her. I kept her home from practice today and she is icing and elevating, have to see how she is in couple of days to see if I need to take her to the doctor. Hoping it's nothing serious! She competed 2 years of level 8 and wants to love up to 9 this year, which is totally within her reach IF she stays healthy.

My younger daughter tried bars for the first time since virus closure and she said she could barely do a kip. She struggled with bars since level 4, and took her 2-3 years to get straight arm kip, and last year as level 6 her bars were actually not too bad. She said she struggled the most compared to her teammates, so I told her to be patient and skills would come back. The rest of the events were uneventful.

I’m so sorry to hear that your older daughter got injured on her second day back. So tough. I hope the injury is not too bad and that it is a quick recovery. And hope bars returns for your younger daughter quickly!! Our gym is still closed so do not know yet how all of this time off will impact my daughters.

 

[JessSyd]

Today during her 3rd practice back she got her cast handstand. She thinks maybe all of the press handstands during quarantine paid off.

Great news about the cast handstand. One thing quarantine really was good for was giving the girls the time to work on their press handstand. The coaches told my daughter’s level that it would really help with the cast handstand.

It isn’t a focus at my daughter’s gym so only the few girls it comes naturally to and the girls training for future international usually get it. Whereas now even the level threes, and tall gangly nearly-teens like my daughter are doing it. I don’t think there has ever been a time in my daughter’s gym when so many girls could press. Particularly not tall mid level girls like my daughter, who pre-quarantine had just decided to accept that they would probably never do it.

 

[kendo348]

Great news about the cast handstand. One thing quarantine really was good for was giving the girls the time to work on their press handstand. The coaches told my daughter’s level that it would really help with the cast handstand.

It isn’t a focus at my daughter’s gym so only the few girls it comes naturally to and the girls training for future international usually get it. Whereas now even the level threes, and tall gangly nearly-teens like my daughter are doing it. I don’t think there has ever been a time in my daughter’s gym when so many girls could press. Particularly not tall mid level girls like my daughter, who pre-quarantine had just decided to accept that they would probably never do it.

That’s awesome! I want to know what they did to achieve this miracle haha... my daughter is tall and while she can cast to handstand (or could, pre-shutdown), she feels like she will never get a press. The week the gym closed she was closer than she’d ever been but now, not so much - even though she has done the prescribed home workout every day her strength has backslid a lot.

 

[JessSyd]

That’s awesome! I want to know what they did to achieve this miracle haha... my daughter is tall and while she can cast to handstand (or could, pre-shutdown), she feels like she will never get a press. The week the gym closed she was closer than she’d ever been but now, not so much - even though she has done the prescribed home workout every day her strength has backslid a lot.

My daughter’s gym set a lot of homework specific to pressing.

-press sitting in straddle
-pressing down from wall handstands
-pressing up against a wall
-toe taps from wall handstand (pressing down until your toes just tap on the ground then pressing up again)
-pressing from straddle to feet
-pressing from feet to handstand
-pressing up from ‘froggy’ position (for the girls having real trouble - my daughter didn’t need this one)
-drag presses

My daughter did the homework for a few weeks without any success. Then I started spotting her through a few presses at the end of her press circuit and that seemed to provide the missing link. She had all the strength, it was figuring out and mastering the necessary weight/balance shift that was the problem. I suspect it is for a lot of girls. Spotting her through the movement pattern helped things click.

 

[kendo348]

My daughter’s gym set a lot of homework specific to pressing.

-press sitting in straddle
-pressing down from wall handstands
-pressing up against a wall
-toe taps from wall handstand (pressing down until your toes just tap on the ground then pressing up again)
-pressing from straddle to feet
-pressing from feet to handstand
-pressing up from ‘froggy’ position (for the girls having real trouble - my daughter didn’t need this one)
-drag presses

My daughter did the homework for a few weeks without any success. Then I started spotting her through a few presses at the end of her press circuit and that seemed to provide the missing link. She had all the strength, it was figuring out and mastering the necessary weight/balance shift that was the problem. I suspect it is for a lot of girls. Spotting her through the movement pattern helped things click.

Thank you! I think she has done all these things but never together in one focused circuit on a regular basis. We will give it a go!

 

[GymDadWA]

1st day back for DD.

She was so happy to see all her teammates and I'm sure her face hurts from all the smiling.

DD has no idea on what skills she may have lost as they didn't really do any skills, the plan is to work on strength and conditioning while slowly easing back into it. Told her to be patient they will ramp it all back up soon enough. I am so curious myself where she is at though, hearing the stories of quick skill reclamation had me intrigued.

 

[springsforlegs]

These stories are lovely, and are giving me hope. We still have no return to gym date but it will likely be mid July at the absolute soonest.

Did anyone‘s kid lose team mates? My daughter’s team has already had two girls who stopped turning up for zooms and are now saying they won’t go back to gym. She’s sad - her teammates are everything and this is going to cause her to have a rethink too.

We didn't just lose teammates, we lost teams, and gyms. This shut down has been bad for so many gyms.

 

[gymisforeveryone]

We've been back for over a week.My girls are very sore, all the time. The first day back they could climb the rope and do presses better than they have been since then, because they are just so sore. They have weekends off but on Monday they were still quite sore. I hope it gets better this weekend. Then they'll have a whole week off starting on next Friday (the gym is closed).

The skills have been good, except the ones that require a lot of upper body strength like cast handstands and clear hips. Giants, giant halfs and other swinging skills are coming along nicely. Beam is also good, the girls have now done maybe 90% of their skills on high beam.
We have flipped vaults once and they were good. Weve not yet done any double backs or drills but twisting seems to be ok for everyone.
The girls who used to have mental blocks or fears with giants and flyaways have surprised me by being very brave. They even asked themselves to be allowed to get back to those skills. They are calm and cool now, which was not expected.
Some of my compulsory girls are having weaker kips than before the lockdown but not terrible. Their tumbling skills have even improved, some of them have spent the last months on trampolines. I know many of you don't like back yard trampolines but I think that it has really helped some of them with air awareness.

 

[Aussie_coach]

We didn't just lose teammates, we lost teams, and gyms. This shut down has been bad for so many gyms.

This pains me so much to read. My heart goes out to all those who lost their businesses, their jobs, their security, their gym and their teams.

 

[TumbleTimes4]

DD had a good first week back. They are easing into skills and doing a lot of basics and drills. Coach actually thinks DD is stronger and her skills are better than before the shutdown. I think she was experiencing burnout before and the break, while long, was actually something she really needed. She seems refreshed and excited now.

 

[Jenny]

My daughter started back last week. 3 days last week, back to full time this week. She's beyond thrilled to be back in the gym and to be done with school. She is going fewer hours now that she's no longer training elite. Having her home more has been amazing for all of us. Her decision, while disappointing at first, I think will be the right decision. Hopefully she can continue to do gymnastics, continue to love the sport and take it all the way to college while still feeling healthy and not broken down physically or mentally.

What made her change her mind about Elite - she had a fantastic qualifier. Does she not want to compete at nationals just once?

 

[RTT2]

A week in for DD and I'm a little surprised by the fact that they all seem to have picked right back up where they left off after 12 weeks of the gym being closed. Coaches had said it would mainly be basics in the beginning but they are close to being right back to where they were when the gym closed. They started doing next level skills the first day back. DD is so happy and seems to be regaining skills along with picking up new skills like this was all nothing. I'm worried there will be injuries in another week or so with the kids going back without a slow buildup, but I also wonder why they really need to do high hours year round if they can come back so quickly.

 

[kendo348]

I also wonder why they really need to do high hours year round if they can come back so quickly.

I too have been wondering this. Is it possible the shutdown will change the prevailing viewpoint on hours and/or taking vacation? Maybe only the latter. I think the risk of increased injuries in the coming months is real, and perhaps for the highest levels nothing will change. But at least compulsories should be able to make a valid case in favor of taking their summer family vacation without chastisement or disappointment from a coach.

 

[JessSyd]

Are coaches spotting? They have been told to do almost no spotting here.

We have been told that return to gym will involve strength, conditioning, shaping, and very little in the way of new skills for the foreseeable future. We’re also going to be extremely limited by caps on numbers. The gym is big but it is shared with a couple of other gymsports and with one person every four square meters, WAG gymnasts are only going to be able to train about half of their previous hours and rec isn’t being brought back at this point at all.

 

[mom2newgymnast]

A week in for DD and I'm a little surprised by the fact that they all seem to have picked right back up where they left off after 12 weeks of the gym being closed. Coaches had said it would mainly be basics in the beginning but they are close to being right back to where they were when the gym closed. They started doing next level skills the first day back. DD is so happy and seems to be regaining skills along with picking up new skills like this was all nothing. I'm worried there will be injuries in another week or so with the kids going back without a slow buildup, but I also wonder why they really need to do high hours year round if they can come back so quickly.

Our optional girls were only about about 8 weeks (and they did do daily zoom conditioning/strength), but I was also pleasantly surprised how quickly they returned to pre break skills. I think this is their 5th week back. The first 3 were ~8 hours and now they are up to 16 hours.The only event that they are taking it somewhat slow on is vault. But the rest of the events, everyone has all their old skills back and they are making a lot of progress on their next level skills. No injuries yet either and while I can't speak for the rest of the team, I can say that my daughter is very happy with her skills and just being there. I do hope that it makes our head coaches realize that maybe taking a little vacation in the summer isn't as bad as they think...

 

[raenndrops]

Are coaches spotting? They have been told to do almost no spotting here.

We have been told that return to gym will involve strength, conditioning, shaping, and very little in the way of new skills for the foreseeable future. We’re also going to be extremely limited by caps on numbers. The gym is big but it is shared with a couple of other gymsports and with one person every four square meters, WAG gymnasts are only going to be able to train about half of their previous hours and rec isn’t being brought back at this point at all.

We are still in the "private lesson" only phase of our return (but the private can actually be siblings working with 1 coach - so we will be taking advantage of that hopefully Monday). July 13, we will move into the "small groups" phase.
Right now, there is NO spotting. We haven't done a private yet, but those who have have worked strength, conditioning, and basics. Then they get a workout list to do the rest of the week (in addition to our Zoom workouts 2x a week). We will learn what "small group" means in the next couple weeks.

 

[Splat]

I believe our gym has been open for 4 weeks now we went straight to full hours but that's not a lot for our gym (max. of 10hours a week for upper levels) week had a week of no rec and are now doing rec classes under 10 gymnasts. We have had 3 major injuries so far. one broken arm, one broken leg and a bad ankle sprain. all the girls were in level 3 not sure if its how the coach brought them back after the break or if it was all unrelated to the break. We didn't do as much conditioning over the break as I would like, but our director isn't a huge fan of conditioning and though it would be a short break. I had no control over it. My level 1 team girls are doing really good and many returned with better form.

On another note I have been fully released to practice again. I retired 2 years ago but still stayed in shape. Due to some ankle problems I have been out practicing even basic skills for over 6 months. I have just recently begun trying to get my skills back. I have started very basic and am mainly working floor skills but it feels nice to be in the gym again.

 

[gymkayla]

We have had 3 major injuries so far. one broken arm, one broken leg and a bad ankle sprain. all the girls were in level 3 not sure if its how the coach brought them back after the break or if it was all unrelated to the break.

Woah definitely more cautious now. Going back to gym tomorrow though!!! So excited!!!!!!