Parents WAG/Xcel does your gym switch between?

[Dream]

Gym we started at had a program for preschoolers then at 6 years old girls some selected for WAG program and others are told they are not WAG material and sent out of the program. This gym says they NEVER move a girl from Xcel into WAG. Those selected go on to train massive amounts of hours with the idea being they will one day be headed to the Olympics.
Now have found gyms who have starter programs for girls up to 8 years old that will then feed into their WAG program and some of these gyms dont even have girls compete until they have Xcel silver skills and they absolutely move Xcel students into WAG. They feel that starting too many hours too young can lead to major injuries before even getting to higher levels of competition.
What are others peoples experiences?

 

[bestmommyever1234]

Gym we started at had a program for preschoolers then at 6 years old girls some selected for WAG program and others are told they are not WAG material and sent out of the program. This gym says they NEVER move a girl from Xcel into WAG. Those selected go on to train massive amounts of hours with the idea being they will one day be headed to the Olympics.
Now have found gyms who have starter programs for girls up to 8 years old that will then feed into their WAG program and some of these gyms dont even have girls compete until they have Xcel silver skills and they absolutely move Xcel students into WAG. They feel that starting too many hours too young can lead to major injuries before even getting to higher levels of competition.
What are others peoples experiences?

Why didn’t your gym move the Xcel kids into WAG?

 

[Dream]

Why didn’t your gym move the Xcel kids into WAG?

They made it sound like that would be impossible that it was decided at 6 if a child was cut out for WAG or not. Then the ones that were started training numerous hours with top coaches and the others would never be able to match that so we just believed that was how things were done in gymnastics but now we are hearing all this other information so it got me curious what other people had experienced.

 

[CluelessGymMom]

My daughter's gym does Xcel only until level 6. Once level 6 skills are reached, the coaches decide which path fits each gymnast best. The girls who transition out of Xcel (about 1/3) test out early in the season.

I personally think this path is wonderful! All girls get the same training through the lower levels, so there is no wondering "what if". I also like how they group during practice. Similar age groups practice at the same time, and they condition together, so they feel like one big team. Then they divide them into skill based groups at each rotation.

 

[Gymgirl84]

My daughter's gym does Xcel only until level 6. Once level 6 skills are reached, the coaches decide which path fits each gymnast best. The girls who transition out of Xcel (about 1/3) test out early in the season.

I personally think this path is wonderful! All girls get the same training through the lower levels, so there is no wondering "what if". I also like how they group during practice. Similar age groups practice at the same time, and they condition together, so they feel like one big team. Then they divide them into skill based groups at each rotation.

I quite like that approach, as we (different country and comp programs) find it really hard when some gymnasts don't progress at the pace we thought they would early on and we want to move them to a less demanding program, with that approach it would be much easier and the feelings wouldn't be so bad about it.

 

[Dahlialover]

WAG stands for “women’s artistic gymnastics”, which includes USAG Xcel and USAG Development program (DP) and all the other women’s gymnastics programs except T&T, acro, and rhythmic. Are meaning DP when you say WAG?

 

[Dream]

Oh maybe that is why the difference!

 

[Dream]

WAG stands for “women’s artistic gymnastics”, which includes USAG Xcel and USAG Development program (DP) and all the other women’s gymnastics programs except T&T, acro, and rhythmic. Are meaning DP when you say WAG?

That could be. They called it WAG but maybe it is their DP program?

 

[Dahlialover]

That could be. They called it WAG but maybe it is their DP program?

It sounds like what your gym is calling WAG is your gym’s own in-house elite training program. Everything about this option would be gym-specific. Only a small number of gyms in the country have programs like this and each one is run differently. This is not the same as DP. DP is the traditional USAG competitive program with levels 1-10. Elite gyms may have their pre-elite track gymnasts compete in DP competitions at certain levels, but they are not on the standard DP track.

At normal gyms that do not train elite, there are usually two tracks: DP and Xcel. Some gyms choose which track gymnasts start in based on ability and some let parents choose what they prefer. At most (but not an all) gyms, it is possible to transition from Xcel to DP. Some gyms have everyone start in Xcel and then they let gymnasts transition to DP once the gymnasts reach the upper levels.

Hopefully this clears things up a bit.