As I’ve reported here I’ve started going back to gymnastics. My skills quickly returned and I feel I’m beginning to break new ground. Below you can watch a couple clips from Tuesday night’s session.
First off, the back flip. I’m happy to be able to do this skill once again on the floor. But as you can see in the video I’m still jumping too far back and not up enough. Sometimes even when you know what you need to do, its not always easy to correct it. But then last night I was on and going just about straight up.
Second is the round-off to the back handspring. One of the things I haven’t quite mastered yet is stringing moves together. Hence this move, as I’m just getting use to it is done on mats. It feels fairly easy but I know I’ll need many more reps in it.
Third in the video is swings on the parallel bars, as I mentioned previously here. One of the great things about video is that is shows you your weaknesses. In some ways it can be even better than a coach, as someone else can tell me what I’m doing, but seeing it myself is something else. What I noticed here was that my legs were not tight and together. Once I corrected that I was getting more air.
I’ll be having more clips in the future.
Good Luck and Good gymnastics,
Logan Christopher
Looks great. You are doing closer to pure gymnastics now in your adult class than what coaches teach kids. Love teaching adult classes. Pure Gymnastics is something that took me decades to understand.
This will help you see the picture better.
Plato: God gave man but two arts, Music and Gymnastics.
Yet…. but. what did Plato really mean….. what our mental picture of “Gymnastics” is did not even exist in his day. So what was he referring too? To understand that one has to think back at what they saw in their work out gym (field). You see to him and his fellows “Gymnastics” existed ONLY in its purest form. Acrobatic and Rhythmic Exercise. They swung and climbed on make shift bars, did balances on tables, benches and each other. They vaulted on and over each other and objects etc. In fact if they spent some time zipping from one of their apparatus to another I guess in today’s terms that would be… PARKOUR.
So… what you are doing is using “ARTISTIC GYMNASTICS” to do the pure form of gymnastics. The one Plato referred too. You are doing Exercise rhythmically using acrobatic skills.
What is old becomes new again.. and with the quickly growing/resurgence of the competitive Gymnastic sports of Tumble and Trampoline and Acrobatic Gymnastics I really feel that this will push gymnastic schools into training kids more in the pure form. This will give kids greater options to choose to excel in.. if they want to ever specialize…… if they want to speithey can then choose ANY of the Competitive gymnastic sports. Staying with teaching kids as if the only thing that makes up Gymnastics is …. “Artistic Men and Woman’s Gymnastics” is simply holding the kids back from reaching their true potential and also limits them from seeing that Gymnastics in it’s pure form is a LIFE LONG SPORT.
If you really want to do Gymnastics in its pure form… free yourself from the constraints of artistic Gymnastics. Use the Artistic equipment open to you in ways you would consider novel…. just be rhythmic and acrobatic about what you do. Certainly those skill will look like out of place “Artistic Gymnastic” skills… but so what….. you’ll be doing the most pure form gymnast in the building. Swing on the PB,s and off them, stand on them and balance….. climb on them and hang from them like artistic monkeys LOL…. climb on the beams and do balances on them… climb up the uprights that hold the High bar up… scoot across to the middle of the High bar… do a few artistic gymnastic skills… then scoot over to the other side of the bar and slide down… ohhhh… watch for the spin locks or T-handles… you might take off a gonad if you don’t. That will be pure gymnastics.. and I’m guessing would be hell-a-fun to do. Here is a video of novel us of playground rings…. this is really something like I suspect you would have seen couple hundred years ago in greece in a field where the men partook in “Gymnastics”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Leb-yrgqdf8&feature=related
coach George
Hey Logan,
I admire you tackling these gymnastics moves once again. I’ve been doing some research and it is difficult to find a legit adult gymnastics class that will actually go as in-depth as the class you seem to be involved with . Thanks to you and the biofeedback protocol I have significantly improved in my neck bridging (up to holding 32kg for a minute), full range HSPUs (against a wall), and general handbalancing (best yet is just over a minute). Any suggestions on where or how to start in a solid adult gymnastics program. I’m in the military and will soon depart for Japan. Any thoughts for out there? I figure in your line of business you have connections all over. Keep up the great content.
-Jon
@Jon Chacon: Glad to hear of your progress using biofeedback training. MY only suggestion is that if you find a facility maybe you can hire a coach for one on one if they don’t offer the training. Or once you display you have some skills they may let you work out on your own in there.