MAG What do you think about the 20-21 season?

[Pwicks]

So I am in NJ and Governor just announced that schools will need to find a way to maintain social distance AND be able to provide at least some in classroom time at the same time. So it has me thinking..... do you guys think that the 20-21 competition season will be canceled?

Can meets still be held if people have to be socially distant?

 

[skschlag]

I think there will be meets. REmember, all guidance coming out now is for fall. ANd here, we have been told we can have all our students in masks in school. So things are constantly changing.

I can see meets that are gymnast only, or only 1 spectator. Maybe virtual meets where all stay at their home gym and take turns on video wiht judges. Maybe duals or 3 way meets. Who knows.

But I think there will be something. THe girls' side is already putting out their big invitational dates. I am sure we will try.

I have to believe there will be something.

 

[Pwicks]

Girls have?!? Wow!

 

[acam1103]

I think one of the big things will be whether or not gyms are willing to risk hosting meets, knowing they may lose a lot of money if numbers go back up and meets can't go on. Also, how early teams have to sign up will influence willingness of parents to fork over the money. I know we typically get our meet schedule in August and money starts coming due in September. There's no way families are going to want to pay for meets that early that may or may not be able to happen.

For us in NY it's not just whether or not the host gym is able to host when the time comes. It is also whether or not we will be able to go. Right now, our rules are that moderate risk youth sports (this is where he lists gymnastics) can start practice on 7/6. However, we cannot travel outside of our region in the state for meets/game/tournaments. Our region of the state is Western New York. The only county in our region that has boys gymnastics teams is the county our gym is in. So as of right now we can have a meet with the one other boys gym in our county and that is it

 

[profmom]

I hope that we can either figure out remote meets or that things ease up a bit by the time meet season starts, Acam. I think we will all be doing a lot more local-ish meets this season; who knows, we may be out that way if state boundaries turn out to be salient. At this point I am just so glad we are looking at being back in the gym safely that I'm not even thinking about meets.

But I remind us all that we have our kids in a sport in which the [state redacted but yes, it's our region] police had to come in and shut down a meet because there was a statewide emergency declaration due to an apocalyptic snowstorm a few winters ago.

 

[Cheryl]

I’m on the fence. We don’t include optionals in our locals, so our meets are all invitationals usually within driving distance. However they usually involve about 150 gymnasts per session. I can’t see this as being able to social distance. The states that we attend meets in are also similar to us in controlling the virus. I know I am not willing to sit in a tightly spaced venue, and I also don’t want to travel 2 hours to hang out in my car while kid performs. We usually do coaching fees in Sept based on the meet calendar, but it’s all up in the air now. Guess I will just play it by ear...feeling lucky we are starting practice soon and son is still looking forward to it, whether we do meets or not.

 

[GymDad23]

USAG did release the 20-21 Rules and Policies a couple weeks ago..............but of course the link they provided just takes you back to the homepage. Figured they would have fixed it by now or at least taken it down. Truthfully, I have no clue what that will cover, but I assume it will have some interchanging parts due to the pandemic. Unless the # of COVID cases drastically decreases by meet season, I don't see any meets not being virtual. I can see one or two judges being at a gym with the host gym team and maybe one other team, depending on the size, running through the events and collaborating with the other judges at another gym. It's better than nothing, but definitely lacks luster.

 

[MuggleMom]

We are supposed to get new comp leos this year---I am hoping we just do a fancy tank leo instead of the expensive longsleeve one just because who knows what this year will bring--and tank leos can be worn in practice and sold easier after they don't fit . I would rather just do some smaller low pressure local meets anyway just to keep training light and no pressure for the girls as they try and get back in the swing of things. I sort of hate meet season anyway so I wouldnt mind a year off but I am probably not in the majority there.

 

[Pirouette]

Our team usually starts competing in December. This is DD17’s senior year and she is hoping and praying for some kind of competition season.

The last meet DD competed at, the first weekend in March, was the Arnold in Ohio. The virus was gaining traction, and a lot of modifications to the meet were implemented. Spectators were discouraged (1-2 parents/guardians ONLY), no admission was charged, lots of recommended sanitation protocols in place already. Fewer vendors available, and fewer concessions. It felt very odd. The stands normally would be quite crowded (4 sessions running at a time), so having less than half of the stands filled seemed so strange. People were on edge due to the unknown.

And now the divisiveness of masks and sanitizing and “it’s all political hype” – I just wonder what it would mean for meets, if they were allowed to happen.

 

[lostinfog]

I keep seeing an ad popping up on my FB for the Texas Challenge hosted by Metroplex with Maggie Nichols as a special guest for the weekend of Aug 29. With the spike here in TX and seeing that the meet entry deadline is August 7 I really wonder if this meet will realistically happen. The ad is new for me at least and the first time I’ve ever seen it was yesterday.

 

[springsforlegs]

I think there will be meets. REmember, all guidance coming out now is for fall. ANd here, we have been told we can have all our students in masks in school. So things are constantly changing.

I can see meets that are gymnast only, or only 1 spectator. Maybe virtual meets where all stay at their home gym and take turns on video wiht judges. Maybe duals or 3 way meets. Who knows.

But I think there will be something. THe girls' side is already putting out their big invitational dates. I am sure we will try.

I have to believe there will be something.

Let's hope we can still have meets. I think if we don't have meets, we will see a lot of gymnasts drop the sport, which will really hurt it in the long run. I haven't looked on the website to see if dates for the boys are up, but I plan to look soon.

 

[skschlag]

Let's hope we can still have meets. I think if we don't have meets, we will see a lot of gymnasts drop the sport, which will really hurt it in the long run. I haven't looked on the website to see if dates for the boys are up, but I plan to look soon.

I think there will be something. It could be virtual, or duals, but I know, if possible, they will figure out a way