As I tell my step daughter
"it's not the will to win that matters, It's the will to prepare to win that matters"
My story,
My child is 7 going on 8 and has been in gymnastics since she was 2. Competing for two years now.
She is very consistent at placing 5th, 4th and 3rd place at meets.
Towards her last 4 meets she is unhappy with her placements. She wants first place very dearly. I think her placements are fine and every time I see her out there my eyes fill up with tears because I am so proud.
I spoke to her before we decided to sign back up at the competitive level. I asked her "do you want to do this for fun, or to win"
She was very stern on wanting to compete to win. I told her if that is the case, we will be going to open gyms and doing a lot of practice at home. It will take a lot of hard work to get first place. She agreed.
Now that it is almost meet time for the past two months we have been going to open gyms and doing practice at home. She is constantly asking "are we done yet, can I play, How many more times"
I try to reiterate as much as I can that we can be done but you haven't changed anything that needs to be fixed in your routines. If you hit the mat at your meet with your toes not pointed, hands not pretty and routines not flowing, you will not be getting first place. (to me that is OK)
She will turn around the next day and say "I can't wait for my meets, I hope i win first place"
I explain to her again, the only way you can win first place is by working really hard and fixing what your coaches say to fix.
I see her at practice fooling around and truly not listening to her coaches when they tell her to redo what she has done wrong. She will do the same thing over and over again with no change. She has had her floor routine (that I hired a private choreographer for) down graded to the very basic routine. A lot was taken out because of her not being consistent with the gymnast poise.
I asked her if she wanted to do the "fun" gymnastics (rec classes) she wants nothing to do with that. She truly lives breaths and dies gymnastics. She is constantly tumbling (the wrong way) loves youtubing gymnastics videos, writes about it in school, and puts on shows for us to all watch.
My question is, how do I know when it is time for quits?
From all of you other parents, at what age did your children start taking this sport seriously?
Should I stick it out one more year in hopes something will click in her head?