Hi, my name is Maggie and I have been cheering for 3 years. I have been trying for a year to get a backhandspring, but it's just not working! Everytime I sit and get ready to go, I throw my arms over my head, and end up landing on my head and looking like a frog! What am I doing wrong? My gymnastics instructor keeps telling me things, and they just don't work! Help!
Maggie~
The Solution
Maggie,
Your suppose to be doing a back HAND spring.. not a back HEAD spring! There's no way around it.. the Back Handspring (BHS) is a sophisticated tumbling skill. Landing on your head is a VERY common problem. Without seeing your handspring personally, it's tough to accurately provide you a solution for the problem, so let me offer a few LIKELY solutions here:
1) PUSH your Elbows straight. The PUSH of the handspring comes MOSTLY from the SHOULDERS... the elbows may by SLIGHTLY flexed JUST before the landing, but staighten completely.
2) Keep your arms NARROW. Your arms should be pressed so tightly together
that you can feel your ears against your arms. The hands should VERY
narrow, almost touching!
3) BE in the HABIT of beginning AND ending your handspring with your arms STRAIGHT OVERHEAD. It's very common for cheerleaders to have STYLISTIC demands for beginning the handspring with the arms reaching straight ahead, or straight down. A WISE tumbler will recognize the difference between STYLE and STRUCTURE. Good STRUCTURE in a handspring suggests that the arms BEGIN and END over head. "Cover your head and keep it!"
4) REACH backwards for the floor with your HANDS, not your head. I know this sounds simple, but as you're beginning to reach backwards for the flooryou've got to THINK "hands to the floor!" and REACH with them. Tumblers who try to reach with their noses, instead of their hands is silly, but common error.
5) PASS THROUGH a COMPLETE handstand position. This is one of the real secrets of GREAT handsprings. In EVERY handspring, the body should pass THROUGH a perfect HANDSTAND. If you have a spotter slow your handspring down a bit, you can easily identify that position and make the correction.
6) PRACTICE your handstand with your arms in the CORRECT position... and STAY in that position for 10-20 seconds at a time.
Question 2
My name is Sam and I have been cheering for a long time! My tryouts are in early August and we are required to have 3 tumbling passes. One is a rounded backhandspring back, and I have that no problem. They want original, unique passes that are difficult and good looking (possibly competition material!) I am an advanced gymnast.. so if you have any unique passes I could do, please let me know! Thanks!!
The Solution
Front tumbling elements that transition into typical back-tumbling skils,
are a GREAT way to add "seemingly" high levels of difficulty and great
looks. The CORE front tumbling skill is the FRONT handspring. If you don't
have one, GET IT!!!
For example:
1) Front Handspring stepout, round-off, backhandspring. In this pass, the
front-handspring is used to gain momementum and takes the place of a hurdle
or run.
2) THREE front Handpring step-outs in a row. (or three fast
front-walk-overs in a row.)
3) Standing Back-handspring STEP-OUT 1/2 twist into a cartwheel or
round-off.
Question 3
My squad is going to Nationals next year (well, we think we are), and we're kind of stuck on what we're going to do for tumbling. My squad can all do standing tucks and handsprings. We were thinking that we want half of the squad doing toe-touches while the other half does a tuck, then vice versa... after the second group lands everyone doing a backhandspring back. We're not sure (1) if this will work and (2) how to build stamina for this and (3) how to position ourselves so we won't hit/touch each other. If you have any tips, or ideas please let me know! Thanks again!
Jani
The Solution
Wow...
It sounds like Ya'll are planning to WIN, Jani!
Synchronized tumbling & jumps is a SURE way to add MEGA flash to a routine.
There are LOTs of possible answers to your questions... here are my first
thoughts.
1) Yes, SURE it CAN work.
2) The handspring, toe-touch is a breeze because the rebound from the
handspring should shoot the toe-touches sky high. Starting a Handspring OUT
OF a toe-touch is a TOUGH one. To build up stamina, practice (on mats) with
three tuck-jumps immediately in a row, no pauses in between. Toss a
handspring on the end and emphasize WELL-FORMED POSITION throughout the
handspring. The toe-touch will be slightly more demanding than a tuck-jump.
To advance, put three toe-touches together, back-to-back, without a pause.
Then toss a handspring on the end. Don't worry about synchronizing at
first, just start building the "muscle." 20-30 repetitions of that series
should have your BEST athlete panting. run through that 2-3 times at each
of your workouts for a couple of weeks. Then start to synchronize them with
only a SINGLE toe-touch followed by the handspring.
3) Shoulder-to-shoulder stagger line is ONE likely positioning. I bet once
you're into practice you'll come up with a dozen possible positions that'll
take you where you want to go.
4) You could add some extra flash by having the "handspringers" facing
BACKWARDS and performing a 1/2 turn INTO the toe-touch.
Be Well,
~
Coach Wayne
Email page to a friend