Voluntaries

[bogwoppit]

Tap, tap, tap.....

 

[Iwannabemargo]

give them a chance Bog, they are probably still trying to get home

 

[Flossyduck]

Lol

Not been back long, we've been out celebrating by stuffing pizza, as you do!

DD had a great comp. Really proud of her. She's really buzzing and happy and proud of herself, the coaches were very happy so all is good. She had no falls, all routines nice and tidy. She was absolutely solid under pressure and looked quite chilled. At one point she was cracking jokes with the other girls behind the beams and I thought she was going to be too complacent and mess up, but no.

She didn't medal. The girls who were on the podium all had giants, all did yurchenkos and all had the full acro series on floor. They deserved their places, but the scores were very tight. We talked about the ankle injury and having to reduce her acro line and back off on vault. It came down to such small margins. In truth, looking at the girls on the podium I'm not sure it would have made any difference, but dd was happy with that. She know what she needs to do and that she has plenty of time before level 3 and she also knows she has some skills in the bank - (her twisting is going well and her beam is flying at the moment much to my surprise as she's never loved beam).

I thought she'd be disappointed not to medal, but she was really positive and being very sensible about it all and I can't tell you how mightily relieved I am to get that over and for it to go well and to be able to put a happy girlie to bed. I don't need a glass of wine tonight. I feel genuinely giddy enough.

Thanks for the support.

 

[bogwoppit]

Great news Flossy. So glad it went well for her.

 

[chocolate]

Well done to your dd flossy. My dd also had a good comp. She placed in the top 3 for vault and bars and also for the overall and combined results from compulsories. Very proud of her and we also celebrated with pizza.

 

[vbbf]

Well done to flossy and chocolates dds. Glad everything went well for you both. Ive had a really good day too watching my regions voluntaries. There were some really good gymnasts with beautiful dancing and amazing floor routines. They were really good. We had all my dds group going to watch and the gymnasts got a few medals. My dd cant wait till its her turn

 

[Iwannabemargo]

Well done ladies, and breathe lol Hope there is lots of ice cream and new leos in the girls near future

 

[Learning Parent GB]

It sounds like everyone had a great day I've been watching to see so I'm happy for them now and I don't even know them!

I'm particularly impressed at little flossy being chilled on the beam - I think that's where the nerves can really show. WEll done everyone.

 

[Flossyduck]

They seemed to have a long, long wait for beam and I have a photo of her lying on her front on a mat, with another girl, colouring!!! Then she noticed me taking pictures and stuck her tongue out, which I thought unnecessary

 

[vbbf]

It sounds like everyone had a great day I've been watching to see so I'm happy for them now and I don't even know them!

I'm particularly impressed at little flossy being chilled on the beam - I think that's where the nerves can really show.

I saw quite alot of falls off beam, on skills like bwo's, cartwheel tucks, jumps and rolls for the some of the level 5s. Luckily no one was hurt they just got straight back up and carried on.

 

[Learning Parent GB]

I'm always impressed by my DDs composure getting up when she's fallen off the beam. She's not at these girls standard, so I am still longing for the day to see a complete routine without a single fall.

 

[Jenny]

Lol

Not been back long, we've been out celebrating by stuffing pizza, as you do!

DD had a great comp. Really proud of her. She's really buzzing and happy and proud of herself, the coaches were very happy so all is good. She had no falls, all routines nice and tidy. She was absolutely solid under pressure and looked quite chilled. At one point she was cracking jokes with the other girls behind the beams and I thought she was going to be too complacent and mess up, but no.

She didn't medal. The girls who were on the podium all had giants, all did yurchenkos and all had the full acro series on floor. They deserved their places, but the scores were very tight. We talked about the ankle injury and having to reduce her acro line and back off on vault. It came down to such small margins. In truth, looking at the girls on the podium I'm not sure it would have made any difference, but dd was happy with that. She know what she needs to do and that she has plenty of time before level 3 and she also knows she has some skills in the bank - (her twisting is going well and her beam is flying at the moment much to my surprise as she's never loved beam).

I thought she'd be disappointed not to medal, but she was really positive and being very sensible about it all and I can't tell you how mightily relieved I am to get that over and for it to go well and to be able to put a happy girlie to bed. I don't need a glass of wine tonight. I feel genuinely giddy enough.

Thanks for the support.

That is fantastic you must be so proud. To go clean is a real achievement. Sounds like she has earned her place in the next few competitions. I know you said she just missed going to nationals for compulsory 4, did she make nationals this time? Our girls picked up some medals but didn't make the team.

 

[Jenny]

Well done to your dd flossy. My dd also had a good comp. She placed in the top 3 for vault and bars and also for the overall and combined results from compulsories. Very proud of her and we also celebrated with pizza.

Super result. She must be a really talented little girl. On to compulsory 4 then! Big congratulations!

 

[Faith]

Gymnatter is getting most of the results up this week

I am amazed at the difficulty- Level 4's flipping yurchenko's and tsuks, DD values of 4.0. The autumn comps seem completely different to spring vols, and as said somewhere in age and out of age are hugely different!

Remember when I went to the spring vols, and was amazed at level 5 out of age having skills like BLO and BWO-BHS on beam? A few of those kids did level 4 in age and got totally blown away, scored mid-bottom of the group.

Another thing I've noticed is there's a big difference with how clubs compete. The big clubs had only one or two that did compulsories *and* voluntaries, but a few more that have the difficulty to do vols only. The smaller clubs competed compulsories, but were noticeably absent for voluntaries. Kind of makes me think that the big clubs have their superstars with the natural form, and the difficulty, and they also have groups where the kids are capable of the difficulty but maybe not the maturity or form to do well at compulsory. The smaller clubs find a talented kid and focus so much on the compulsory (for prestige maybe? So they can say they have compulsory/elite kids?) or for some reason or another don't have the difficulty to compete in the voluntaries. The rest of the kids in those clubs generally compete out of age regionally.

I do see why we have our system. But I'm still convinced we're narrowing the field too young, and kids are being channelled one way or the other at age 8/9. Only the big clubs or exceptional coaches seem able to keep later starters or developers on track so the skills are all there when they are ready to cross over to elite track...

 

[Iwannabemargo]

It is sad and it misses possible stars. Geography is always a problem with our system of a few centres of excellence, particularly in sports that require a high level of training at a young age.

In many sports you can receive good local tuition and then go on to excel as an older teenager/adult, so moving away to train is not really a problem. I'm thinking football, rugby, cricket, cycling etc. Whereas so many hours so young in life is preclusive to anyone outside reasonable commuting distance to HPC's and unfortunately that is the majority of the country.

The ability to dip back in for the ones who stick it out til older would be great but from what I read here an impossible dream.

 

[Flossyduck]

That's a very good analysis Faith. Pretty accurate I'd say. The only addition I would make is that more girls from smaller club enter voluntaries in our region because they have the difficulty but not the rigorous attention to form and detail required for compulsories.

I know there has been discussion about the compulsory system being designed to have elite track kids focus on form and to limit the difficulty in the early years to 'protect' them. I always found those comments surprising as it doesn't reflect what dd's experience in the gym has been or what I have seen of training.

Whilst compulsory may well have kids competing relatively simple routines, but I know that what is happening in the gym is well beyond what they are competing. By the time most girls in dd's group did their compulsory 4, they were very well on the way to having the skills for compulsory 3 and beyond.

DD is learning half pirouettes on bars, she has been doing tuck back and a half to land on a mat stack on her back in prep for double backs. I know that these things are a long, long time in the drill stage before they become real, but that's where the difference in hours comes in. They have the time to focus on fine tuning routines and refining form for compulsories/current level, as well as up-training at least a level or two and even prepping beyond. Kids in smaller clubs or on fewer hours tend to have to do one or the other.

It has been said on here already, that to succeed on the elite path at the lower levels you need the form and control which doesn't suit all girls, but to be able to move across later you need to know that these girls have also been working up to bigger skills too and to have roughly kept up with them. The voluntaries gives just a glimpse into what's also going on behind the scenes. And that brings us back to the hours again.

I do think in our club the open age group seems to keep up skill wise, or roughly seems to, but even so their success at challenge cup has been mixed.

So how to make it work...??

 

[Katie123]

If it is becky bell your talking about, she moved to sapphire just before she stopped. (our club went to sapphire last summer and trained with all the sapphire top squad like gabby jupp, Ellie Thompson etc.. and she was there) im pretty sure she was injured just before vol 3 (just after we went) which is why she competed compulsory 3 and not vol and now she has stopped gym and is doing athletics x