Make it or Break it

Hey guys (and gals),
I'm back! I know it has been a while, but I'm ready to crank out some more posts for you :)

That said, It's that time of year again! Yep, I'm talking about move-ups. Move-up week is a special time of a gymnasts year when she (or he) learns weather or not she moves up. It is the sweet release of all the stress of the weeks, months, and days before. Though some are thrilled in that they move up, others fall short and are left to wonder where they went wrong. 

One way to better secure yourself in the next level up is to get your up-skills. These are the skills that you need in order to compete your routines in the next year. For example, if you would like to move up to level 5 you will need to be able to compete a flyaway on the bars (among other things), because you will have that in your routine. 

This leads us to tip number one in a move-up how-to weekly blog guide, and that is to get all of your skills.
If you don't see your skill up here, leave a comment your skill and I'll share the tips with you via comment box ;)

Bars

Kip

• The gymnast should concentrate on kipping up late. 
• Try to keep well extended until after the glide starts to swing back, then think about pulling your kip up hard. 
• Think about the pull in the kip like pulling up your pants. You put your ankles near the bar, treat the bar as your belt and pretend that you are pulling up your pants. It's kind of silly sounding, but it helps. 
• Pretend like something you really love is on the other side of the bar. Once you get to the top of the bar, after you pull, lean over the bar and try to reach with your head for whatever it is that you want.

Cast to Handstand

• Work a lot of casts. When you are working these casts, make sure to focus on having good form and trying to lower back to the bar slowly in order to strengthen your muscles. Strength is a very large part of being able to do a cast handstand, along with courage, so it may take a little bit of time. 
• Do arm pulls. In this drill, you wrap a theraband around a sturdy pole or other object, grasp the ends of the theraband, and pull down as far as you can. Then let your arms slowly release until they are above your head. Like when you are slowly lowering from your cast, this will help with the strength of being able to push your shoulders open into the handstand position.
• Do punch straddle cast handstands. In this drill, place a floor bar in front of you and grab hold of the bar with hands about shoulder width apart, then kick up to handstand and lower down to the floor by planging (closing your shoulders). Once you get near the ground, punch with your feet and split your legs apart as if you were doing a straddle cast handstand. Repeat multiple times. 

Giant

• Drills such as handstand hollow fall to a mat on floor bar help with falling aggressively into your tap. To create this drill, place an 8" mat on the floor and put a floor bar in front of it. Kick to handstand with your hands on the bar and fall in an extended hollow to the mat.
• Lots of back extension rolls will help with the top of the giant's swing. When doing these back extension rolls, make sure to watch your toes. This will develop a feel for leading with your toes to handstand as apposed to arching to it.
• Focus on tapping when you are under the bar and not before then. An early tap can cause the gymnast to throw their chest over the bar and arch. If you are having trouble with this, work on tap swings and focus on a late tap that goes up and not so much forward.

Beam

Cartwheel

• Try to look under your bad arm as you do your cartwheel and watch your foot reach the ground. This will cause a gymnast to square their hips, making it easier to land.
• Set up drills with mats right next to the beam. One of these is where you put two channel mats (really tall rectangular mats) up next to the beam and do cartwheels between those. This drill also helps with squareness because the gymnast is not able to move their legs to one side or the other without hitting the mats.
• Try doing the cartwheel a little faster. This will make it easier for your legs to go right over the top of your head and not around the side.
• Have a coach slowly spot you in order to drill the positions you need to be in into your head.
• If you continually are falling to one side, don't try to stick, but to fall onto the opposite side of the one you usually fall to.

Back Walkover

• Practice on floor lines A LOT. This won't help with your hands very much since there is no real danger in putting them wider than 4" apart when you are on the floor, but it is good for working on having square hips.
• If you can't get your hands together on the beam, try raising the height of the beam. This may sound scary, but removing the option of widening your hands helps a lot of gymnasts get their hands on. Remember, if you're scared, you can always ask a coach to spot you on your first one.
• If the previous suggestion didn't help, and you're still not getting your hands on, try holding a ping-pong ball or other small object in between your thumbs. Squish the ping-pong ball as much as you can with your thumbs while your hands are above your head as if you were about to do a back walkover. When you do your back walkover, think about the pressure that you put on the ping-pong ball in order to make your hands closer together.
• Try to think about stretching tall before your back walkover. If your hips move out to one side or another, the skill is extremely hard to land.

Back Handspring Step Out

• A lot of repetition is good for this skill as well. The better you are at the skill on a floor line, the better at it you will be once you build your confidence for the high beam. 
• Work on handstands with the proper back handspring hands: bad hand in front of good with hands turned out and in a line on the beam. This will help you go right to the correct hand position when you do back handsprings on the beam.
• Work back handsprings up to a panel mat. Back handsprings on beam differ from the ones on the floor because they are supposed to be more of a jump to handstand than a traveling skill.
• When you want to start doing the back handsprings on a beam, create an action plan. This can be as simple as "today I'm going to do them on the floor beam, then the beam with a red mat, then the beam with the brown mat." Take slow steps, you don't want to jump into a back handspring that you are not physically or mentally ready for.

Floor

Front Handspring

• Blocking drills will help with the flight element of the skill from your hands to your feet. Handstand hops up to a panel mat is a great drill for this. As your strength increases, add more and more layers on the panel mat that you are hopping up to.
• Kick aggressively to handstand with your hands and shoulders away from a padded wall. This should allow only your heels to hit, practicing the heel drive to tight arch that is a big part of your front handspring. In this drill, really focus on keeping your hips forward and your arms and head back, since tucking forward is a very common mistake in this skill.
• Front limbers are also very helpful if you keep your head back while completing them. This will help the gymnast get a feel for leaving their head released throughout the skill.
• Starting from a bridge with hands near a wall, walk your hands up the wall to a stand. Make sure, again, to keep your head back the whole time. Like the front limber and the kick to handstands, this will help you work on head back and open hips. 

Back Handspring Back Tuck

• Do lots of round off back handspring punch to candle on a resi mat. This will help with learning to set into your back tuck. The hardest part of this drill for most is figuring out spacing, so if you need to you can set down a marker of where to hurdle for your round off or something like that.
• As you do the drill above, have someone from your team stand at the opposite end of the resi mat and hold up a number on their hands while you do your set to candle. Afterwards, they will ask you what number they put up, and if you spotted your set correctly, you should be able to answer them correctly.
• Make sure you really focus on keeping your head in because the most common problem gymnasts have with this skill is throwing their head out and whipping their back tuck over.
• Have a coach spot you so that you can feel more comfortable with working on your set.

Switch Leap

• Lots of kicking will help strengthen your legs for a better "rip" in your leap. Try placing one of your feet on a mat that is just below hip height and lift your heel to tap your foot on the mat. You can also do this in an arabesque with your foot instead facing down on the mat, and your body facing away from it. Make sure to really focus on straight legs and pointed toes since bad form in this will appear in your switch leap on the floor later.
• Do switch leap to panels. In this drill have your good leg bent 90 degrees and out in front of you while you're in a knee-lunge. Kick your back leg up and once you are above the panel mat (in the air), switch your legs. this will help with work on altitude.
• Do TONS of regular leaps and switch leaps on a trampoline. With therabands, with weights, without anything, there are many different ways to do them. Again, make sure you really focus on straight legs and pointed toes.
• The last thing that you can do that will REALLY help with your leap is to stretch out. If you have both your good and bad split down evenly (preferably to the floor) you'll see some great improvements in your switch leap.

Vault

Front Handspring

• Lots, if not all, of the drills and ideas explained about the floor front handspring will also be helpful with this skill.
• Most importantly, focus on your run, your board punch, and your heel drive. Without these ingredients, you won't have the delicious cake that is your front handspring. 
• One way to easily work on those three things is to do a lot of front handspring to flat back drills onto a resi mat.
• You can also put a resi mat behind the vault with about 8" of mat above the table (depending on your vault height, you may need to put a few 8" mats on top). In this drill you pretend like the mat behind the vault is a panel mat and hop up to it while you are vaulting. This will help with the timing of your block off of the table.

I hope this has helped so far, and that you will come back soon for some more tips on move-ups!

Work on my strong Internet gymnasts!

~Joanna

p.s. most of the information in this post consisted of tips and tricks that I had picked up while I was working out at my gym. The other parts were from http://www.drillsandskills.com/skills/index and http://www.chalkbucket.com/forums.

New Look

Hey everyone!
As you can see, I've changed up the design a little bit for the welcoming of spring! Never fear though, it's still the same blog done by the same people (I could tell you were concerned). If you like my blog so far, make sure to let your friends know about it! The more readers the merrier :).

Thanks for coping with my craziness
~ Joanna

Mind Locked

"Gymnastics is the hardest, scariest, toughest, most painful, challenging and demanding sport...

Gymnastics is a lot about pushing through. Pushing through the small issues. The small pains, the small frustrations, the small problems. You push through your boredom to do just one more skill. Most of all, you work hard to push through the fears. We've all been there, and if you haven't you will be. Standing on the runway, the block, the floor, or the beam. You're going over and over in your head, adrenaline coursing through you. You want to go, you want to make your coach, your teammates, your parents, and yourself proud. Something is stopping you though. Just when you were so close - nothing. Your mind is locked. Even with something as simple as letting go of the bar, you can't do it. Not even your strongest will seems to make a change. My coaches have always said that you have to want it more than you are afraid of it. This is a big thing to get over though. Many people get mad at themselves because they are so close yet seem to be so far. Words like "just shut up and go" and "I'm so bad" cross their minds.

Don't let the frustration get to you. Don't let your fears win. This is where the mental toughness part of this sport comes in. Gymnasts all over the world are working hard to block "bad" words and thoughts from their minds. To be completely clear. Just remember, everybody has these.  Many gymnasts say that mental blocks are one of the worst parts of gymnastics, and along with that, many have gotten through them. There are a few simple actions that will greatly help you on your journey to the key to your mental success.

#1 Talk to your coach
I know that it may be hard because you feel like your the only one, but in all reality almost every gymnast has a mental block at some point in time. Your coach has most likely seen this many other times with many other girls. If you explain to her that you're trying your very hardest, I'm sure she'll understand and be able to help with figuring out a game plan to help you get comfortable with the skill.

#2 Step back
What are you talking about?! Are you crazy?! You expect me to step down? I can't! There's no time for backtracking!

Whoa whoa, hear me out. Finding a progression of a mentally hard skill that you can do really helps. For example, if you are too scared to do it alone, ask a coach to spot you until it feels like second nature. Or say you are afraid to do a cast to handstand on the high bar- start with the low bar or the pit bar first. That way you can get your body and mind comfortable with the skill before moving on. Even if it feels like the end of the world to have to take a step back, doing so will help you way more than freezing up every time you try and do the harder skill.

#3 Break it down
This one happens to be the hardest for me. The idea is that you focus on only one thing during the skill, making the overall goal the complete clearing of your mind, that way there is no room for second guessing and/or "bad" or "angry" thoughts. For example, if you are doing a release move like a flyaway, you could just focus on pointing your toes in your tap. Instead of being afraid of doing a "scary" flyaway, you are just doing another beautiful tap swing. The catch is that you can not once think of how you are afraid of the up coming skill otherwise this method may not work.

#4 Mentally Choreograph
Like the last tip, the idea behind this is to focus on doing the easy, simple things perfectly in order to clear your mind of those scary thoughts. Mental choreography is usually three kinds of words connected to your skill. These kinds include technical statements which include corrections such as "block" and "tight legs", Energy statements which bring energy levels up with words like "push!" and "go!", and self-esteem statements which give confidence through phrases like "I can do this" and "I'm ready". Teaching yourself to combine these types of statements for your skill helps greatly with better disciplined thinking.

#5 Visualize your skill
Did you know that just closing your eyes and pretending to do the skill you are so afraid of is just as good as actually doing it? I know, I still can't quite understand either. With this, the more detail you can imagine, the better. If your heart starts racing when you visualize, or if you see yourself failing, keep at it and begin to spend the most time on the parts of the skill that scare you the most.

#6 Watch a video
If you have videos of yourself doing the skill that scares you, I'd advise you watch it. This helps with convincing your brain that you can actually do it, so showing that you can over and over again may help. Remember though that this tip doesn't always help everyone.

#7 KEEP AT IT
Giving up is the #1 way to guarantee your failure with the skill. Hiding from situations that you have to do it in or giving up on yourself ever being able to do it is the WORST POSSIBLE THING YOU COULD DO. Just stay patient with yourself. You can and will get the skill, it's mostly just a matter of learning how your mind works so you can get it back on track. If you try a bunch of different methods whole hearted, you will get there. Whatever you do DON'T GIVE UP!

...But it is also the most amazing, beautiful, incredible and wonderful sport and I love it!"

Think on my strong internet gymnasts!
~ Joanna





p.s. for more information on mental toughness go to  http://gymnastics.about.com/od/trainingadvice/f/mentalblock.htm and http://khenni.wordpress.com/2009/02/12/mental-choreography-a-definition/

Sweet Dreams

*yawn* 
Good morning gymnasts of the vast and wide Internet!

Today I'm going to be discussing something VERY important.... SLEEP.
Did you know that most people are asleep for one third of their life? Along with that, the record for the longest period without sleep is 18 days, 21 hours, 40 minutes? The record holder reported hallucinations, paranoia, blurred vision, and memory lapses. Pretty weird. You see, we are just beginning to go into the depths of learning that sleep is a very key part of our existence. We've only been studying it for the past 20 years or so. One thing we know for sure is that we need to sleep. No options. Sleep deprivation is a serious health issue, and if you get deprived enough, a fatal one. 

So what does sleep do for you? Well first of all, it gets rid of that horrible drowsy/depressed feeling that you get when you are tired, but it does have other key parts too. There are many theories for why we sleep, all being backed up by great amounts of research, but we as humans are not yet fully sure the main reason why we sleep. 

Some of the theories that scientists have made so far are:

The Inactivity Theory: One of the earliest theories of sleep suggests that inactivity at night is an adaptation that served an advantage by keeping us out of harm’s way at times when we would be particularly vulnerable. Animals that were able to stay still and quiet during these periods of vulnerability had an advantage over other animals that remained active.

The Energy Conservation Theory: The energy conservation theory suggests that sleep is used because you can reduce your energy demand during part of the day or night, especially at times when it is harder to obtain food. 

The Restorative Theories: Another explanation for why we sleep is that sleep provides an opportunity for the body to repair and rejuvenate itself. Studies have shown that animals deprived entirely of sleep lose all immune function and die in just a matter of weeks. This is also supported by findings that functions in the body like muscle growth, tissue repair, protein synthesis, and growth hormone release occur mostly, or in some cases only, during sleep. 

The Brain Plasticity Theory: One of the most recent ideas for why we sleep is based on findings that sleep is works directly with changes in the structure and organization of your brain. This is called brain plasticity. Though not fully understood, we can conclude that its connection to sleep is critical. Though most of the connections were found for infants, links for adults were seen too. These were found in the effect that sleep has on people's ability to learn and preform many different tasks.

Though none of these theories were totally proven, it's still evident that sleep has a pretty big impact on a large part of our lives. 

So, how much sleep do you need?
A while ago I went to the Pacific Science Center in Seattle and they had a quiz to tell  you how much sleep you needed based on factors like age and lifestyle. I couldn't quite remember what it was, and I haven't found anything like it online, so here's a chart of how much sleep you might need:

These times vary among people and may change based on different factors

Though this chart suggests 7-9 hours for adults, most Olympians sleep for at least 10 hours per night. This means that if you were to get up for school at 7am, you would have to go to bed at 8:30pm. I know with my gym schedule, that's when I usually get home. This may be a large factor in the fact that most adults don't even get near the 7 hour minimum for sleep.

Did you know that there are also calculations allowing you to get up at the perfect time in your sleep cycle in order to be less drowsy? I went onto http://sleepyti.me/ and found out that if you need to wake up at 6:45am (like me), it would be optimal to go to bed at 9:45 PM or 11:15 PM? This is of course, not bringing in the 10 hours of total sleep factor. 

So, what is your sleep schedule going to be like tonight?

Snore on my exhausted Internet gymnasts.

~Joanna




p.s. I got my facts on sleep from http://www.abc.net.au/science/sleep/facts.htm, http://healthysleep.med.harvard.edu/healthy/matters/benefits-of-sleep/why-do-we-sleep, http://www.webmd.com/sleep-disorders/features/sleep-like-an-olympian?page=3, and http://www.sleepfoundation.org/article/how-sleep-works/how-much-sleep-do-we-really-need

Make sure to check out http://sleepyti.me/ too!

Hey Again!

Hello again :)

This is just a friendly reminder that this is for a school project, so it'd be greatly appreciated if I could get some feedback down there in the comment box. I guess you don't need to, but I'd really appreciate it because it would help when I'm writing my report. 
So, If you have any questions about any of the information on my posts; if you want to give me suggestions for what I could try doing next; if you have any ideas for future posts; or if you just want to talk about your experiences with any of the topics, your words are very welcome! Just check out the comment box below!

Thank you for being so helpful!
~Joanna

Golden Cake and Other Treats

Nastia Liukin going for the gold... cake...

Desserts. From the most delicious chocolaty cake to the most delectable banana split. Who can resist the calling of a home-made blond brownie? Not to mention the ice cream that has your name written all over it. Besides, you're a gymnast. Surely someone can eat a brownie, so long as they work out for like, 12 hours a week. 

A brownie here, an ice cream sandwich there. How much is too much? Sure, you don't struggle with weight gain now, but you're most likely not going to be a gymnast for the rest of your life. Surely your habits will catch up with you...

Gymnasts, along with most athletes, need mostly proteins, fats, and carbohydrates in their diet. When a gymnast is craving one of these things, they go and get it. In this instance, they are probably craving carbohydrates, or "carbs". Cake and Cookies are filled with tons of carbs, so they provide the necessary parts to fill the hole. Though these sweet treats are delicious and work for filling in for the carbs you need, they aren't really beneficial in any other way. Getting used to eating sweets all the time could lead do bad eating habits when you are older. besides, there are foods that are both delicious and nutritious as well as full of carbs to fill your needs. Also, you could think about eating more snacks in-between your meals in order to better space your intake. Dr. Josh at Gymnast Care reccomends you eat breakfast, a midmorning snack, lunch, a pre-workout snack, during workout snack, and dinner.

Some delicious and easy-to-make desserts for your lunch include:

Ants on a Log
Take a celery stick, fill the concaved part with peanut butter, and top with raisins or chocolate covered raisins.

Peanut Butter and Nutella Sandwich
Take two slices of sandwich bread (white or wheat), spread nutella over one slice, spread peanut butter over the other slice, put the two peices together with the spreads facing inwards.

Dark Chocolate
This one is pretty self explanitory, I enjoy eating it dipped in peanut butter, but just plain is fine too :).


Rock on my hungry internet gymnasts!

~Joanna






p.s. I got the information for this post from stayfueled.com by Gymnast Care. Check them out on facebook!

Snacking During Breaks

Think. Yes, right now. When was the last time you had practice? Now think of all the cool (or not so cool) stuff that you did. Ok, now I want you to try and remember what you ate for snack. Was it healthy? Did it fuel you enough for the rest of practice? It seems that every day I'm at gym, at least one person on my team may have a snack that is delicious, but not good for her. So while things like TGI Friday's' "Potato Skins" chips may look good you might want to swap that one out for some trail mix. 

BAD

Of course, You have to start off with the obviously bad stuff. Things like cold pizza, cake, and burgers. One of my old coaches actually had a teammate that had a McDonald's burger at snack once, and they all had to run until she threw up (it only took 30 minutes). There's also things like chips, candy, and other "junk" type foods that probably shouldn't be on your snack time menu. Those granola bars that are covered in chocolate and deliciousness? Yeah, you should probably supplement them with something better if you really want one. Always, always, always make sure that those fruit snacks are really beneficial, too. Labels that contain weird names like polydimethylsiloxane probably aren't that good for you either. 

(By the way, polydimenthylsiloxane [PDMS] is used in foods at some of your favorite fast food restaurants as well as in Silly Putty, dry-cleaning solutions, silicone and head-lice treatments AND it's also a bonding agent. Eat up!)

GOOD

Good foods are almost as easy to find as the bad. Things like nuts and meats give you the protein you need to maintain your energy throughout your practice. Fruits and Vegetables are low in fat while still filling you up and giving you the  essential vitamins and minerals, fiber, and other substances that you need. The best thing to remember when choosing a healthy snack is to balance your food groups. Just protein is great, but you're missing those vitamins, and just fruit is delicious, but it's not going to hold you up for long. Some awesome choices for the best of both worlds are things like apples in peanut butter, fruit and nut granola bars (check the ingredients for artificial sugar content. Usually things that end in -ose), fruit filled yogurt, and other things of that sort!

Recipe!

Homemade chewy dark chocolate cherry almond granola bars

Ingredients:

1 2/3 cups rolled oats 

1/3 cup raw honey 

1/3 cup whole wheat pastry flour 

1/2 tsp salt 

1/2 Chocolate Bar, crushed (chocolate chips are also fine)

1/2 cup dried cherries 

1/2 cup slivered almonds 

1 tsp vanilla extract 

1/4 cup coconut oil 

1/4 cup organic brown sugar

Directions:

1. Butter or oil an 8x8 baking pan.

2. In a large bowl, combine all ingredients. Mix thoroughly. 

3. Place the mixture onto the prepared baking pan and pat down firmly so that it's 1/2" thick. 

Tip* When using a larger baking sheet, scoot the mixture to one side and cover the exposing edge with a thin piece of foil to prevent it from getting hard in the oven.

4. Bake at 350F for 20-25 minutes or until the top is golden brown.

5. Allow to cool before cutting.

Tip* The coconut oil gives these bars a hint of coconut flavor. If you’d like more, feel free to add 1/2 cup unsweetened coconut flakes.

I don't know about you, but these sound DELICIOUS to me! They also sound pretty easy to make, that way people who have a busy schedule will have time to make them too :)

Bake on my hungry Internet gymnasts!

~Joanna

Information on polydimethylosiloxane found at: http://science.discovery.com/life-earth-science/10-common-weird-ingredients.htm

See more recipes at: http://www.spain-in-iowa.com/2012/08/homemade-chewy-dark-chocolate-cherry-with-almond-granola-bars/#sthash.K7lOd4aF.dpuf

Buns, Ponytails, and Hairspray... Oh My!

Hey girls and -possibly- guys!

Sorry I haven't posted in a while, I was hoping life would slow down for me during winter break. No such luck. Anyways, one day 'till school and here I am, sitting with time on my hands, ready to give my readers a brand-new post! Hooray! (better late than never... am I right?)

Anyhow, I had my second "real" meet just yesterday. At my gym, all the girls on my team have to wear a high bun that is smashed into our heads with absolutely NO hair falling out. After we do that, it is a requirement for us to spray so much hairspray onto our doo so that our hair feels like styled barbie-doll hair.

Even with that much hairspray and even bobby pins, reaching towards seamless security, it still seems that our hairdoos are not good enough. At our meet, I couldn't help but noticing about half of the girls on our team had hair bob up and down and up and down and- well, you get the picture. This made me wonder if it is really worth it to put so much stuff in your hair in the first place. Sure, it looks nice at first, and it is harder for the hair to get in your face, but I'm sure that buns are not the only hairdoo that can do that for you. Not to mention the fact that all the hairspray caked onto our head can lead to other problems with dryness of the scalp and hair. 

With this question I ventured into the internet. What I found was not totally shocking. There are actually a few web-articles about different ways for gymnasts to do their hair. There are even some websites (like this one http://www.livestrong.com/article/549267-the-best-ways-to-do-a-gymnasts-hair/) that give different hairstyles for different lengths of hair and even different looks, like sleek or fun. It turns out that there are many different hairstyles to choose from. If you are still set on your bun, I'm sorry to say that I couldn't find any other ways to do it other than the recommended, gel it and spray it. There's still hope though because I learned that you don't actually have to worry about the whole dry scalp as long as you wash your hair as soon as you can and you don't wear the spray too often. I also found that there are actually specific ways to spray hairspray to get the most out of your product. For instance, you should start by looking at what the bottle of spray says it's for. For more secure doo's, look for bottles that say ultra-strong hold or something along those lines. 

What doo's are you going to try for your next meet/event? Let me know in the comments!

Doo on my fashionable internet gymnasts!

~Joanna

P.S. How am I doing? Comment \/\/\/

P.P.S. Hairspray facts found at http://www.schwarzkopf.com/sk/en/home/hair_repair/tips_and_tricks/styling_tricks/how_to_use_hair_spray_properly.html and http://www.skin-remedies.com/hair-products.html