Here’s my tips as a gymnast that used to struggle with leaps- first of all don’t avoid the split jumps/leaps, there not needed but they help a lot on beam and floor to use at least one split position somewhere in the routine. As an alternative straddle jumps are always useful but they get a lot of deductions if not done with open legs and chest up.
What I would work on is:
1. You may have your split but if your back knee is not rolled under you don’t really have a proper full split making it more likely to bend without enough flexibility.
2. To get the front leg up just do lots of front kicks, heck even walk around school doing kicks if your not embarrassed….
3. Try using resistance bands on your legs. Do small straight leg split jumps to build muscle, and slowly work to hitting full split on trampoline, then floor.
4. This may all fail and not click for years, I did tons of drills and finally after about 4 years something just clicked and I have perfect leaps now, be patient and at the end of the day remember everyone has there things they can do, not everyone will be good at everything.
5. Straddle jump wise of you decide to work on them start with lots on trampoline and connected on floor for practice snapping your legs up and down aggressively. Make sure to have your legs come up directly to the side- not I front of you and piling your hips, this looks and scores really awful.
Let me know if you’d like any more tips or have any more leap questions! Good luck I feel the struggle
