Gym Momentum

Cast Handstand Training

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In Developing A Plan For Bars  I wrote about the importance of having a plan to teach skills in the right order. There are few skills that are more important (or more deducted) than the Cast Handstand.

I had a coach ask me, “is there a way to teach cast handstands WITHOUT spotting?” In short. NO. Or at least not that I have found.

I am not a proponent of mindlessly spotting casts over and over and HOPING that a gymnast can figure it out. Like everything, you need a plan.

Reasons for spotting:

MUSCLE MEMORY through repetition of the correct BODY POSITION

Alleviate Fear. Most have hear of falling over. That is why in the process I teach a 1/2 pirouette. They will know what their body has to do if/when they fall over. I also make sure I spot cast handstands on the high bar as well.

Cast Handstand Progression

Handstand Shape.

  • Handstand Hold
  • Handstand Walking (lead up to pirouette)
  • Handstand Hold on Floor bar (pirouette to come down)
  • One Arm Handstand on Floor Bar
  • Handstand pirouettes on floor bar

Strength Exercises

  • Press Handstands
  • Bungee Pulls
  • Weight Pulls (Mean 18 – 6 all the way up, 6 1/2 way up, 6 from horizontal to all the way up)
  • Planche leans

Spotted Exercises

  • Swing on P-bars to get them to lean over
  • Swing up to Handstand on P-bars
  • Small Casts for Form
  • Cast Handstands Pirouette out
  • Cast Handstand in Undergrip
  • Spotted Casts on High Bar

Here are a few of the drills I use that do not need spot. I do believe you need to monitor everything to ensure correct body positions.

Some Spotted Drills

https://youtu.be/F3xvv1dCbMg

Straddle  Cast Handstand Drills

I am sure I will be adding to this.

Send me YOUR IDEAS!

Pak Salto Drills

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One of the biggest problems with Pak Salto is controlling the rotation.

TOO MUCH- You skid across the floor on your butt

TOO LITTLE- You eat the bar

Here are drills that I use for control and reach. I try to establish these drills pretty easy because they share some of the same actions with other skills like fly away and over shoot on bars and even the Yurchenko on vault.

I try to make 1 or 2 of these drills an everyday thing.
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Shoposhnikova Drill

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The other day I was listening to some coaches brag about the difficulty and intensity of their workouts leading up to a competition. My question is:

“is that intensity and difficulty contributing to the gymnasts success or is it hard just for the sake of being hard?”

Cramming for an exam is a time-honored practice for most students. Gymnastics competitions like tests are stressful, sure, but you can not cram for a competition.

Excellence in gymnastics is rarely determined the week before the competition. It is determined through consistent training in the WEEKS and MONTHS prior to the competition. This is a lesson many gymnasts and coaches forget. There should be some intense and difficult parts of the training cycle but each training sessions should have attainable goals. Whether that is skill acquisition or a set amount of routines.

Coaches need to remember that there are only 2 guarantees for gymnasts.
You are going to get hurt.
You are going to be frustrated.

If a coach has a plan to deal with injuries they will be able to alleviate some of the frustration. Recently I was working with a gymnast who was coming off a lower body injury. Nothing serious but it reduced the amount of time that she could train and the events she could do. Essentially she was only allowed to do bars.

Realistically how much was she going to accomplish at bars? She could not do 4+ hours of bars every day without risking injury.
I needed to come up with a plan to continue the progress on bars with out burning her out.
It is very important to have the gymnast involved with the plan.
What are her goals?
Short and Long Term?
What is the work load she feels she can handle?

With this gymnast she has a very good clear hip and hecht action. The decision was made to work Tkatchev and Shopashnikova. 2 skills with the same action.

These are basic questions every coach should ask on an ongoing basis as a check to make sure training is on target.

What are you doing?

Who are you doing it with?

Is what you are doing appropriate for who you are doing it with?

Why are you doing it? Is it NEED to do or NICE to do?

How are you doing it? Is there a better way or a better mode?

When are you doing it? Is it appropriate for the time of the training years and even the stage of the athlete’s career?

And always use the KISS strategy. Keep It Simple, Stupid.

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Clear Hip and Giant Lecture Notes

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CLEAR HIP CIRCLES AND GIANTS
TONY RETROSI
tony@gymmomentum.com

5 SKILLS EVERY GYMNAST NEEDS TO BE SUCCESSFUL
THE BIG 5
KIP
CAST HANDSTAND
CLEAR HIP HANDSTAND/ Other in bar skill
GIANT
FLYAWAY

Where it all starts
Straight
Hollow
Tight Arch
Arm extension
THE HANDSTAND
Clear Hip Circle

Body Shape Rules
Strong CORE Strength. (What is your Core?)
Ability to Hold Static Shape BEFORE you try to move through it
Work parts independently as well as together
Body weight, the light resistance, increase resistance with out losing shape.
Important Shapes
STRAIGHT
HOLLOW
ARCH

Clear hip/ Toe Hand/ Stalder Drills
Back Hip Circles in a row. Straight Body
Baby clear hip circles in a row. Getting bigger. Maintain Shape
Quick turns on strap bar (too much time bad for wrists)
LOTS and LOTS of Back Extension Rolls
Press Shaping
for Toe Handstand and Stalder
Jump Clearhip/ Toe on
Drills
Jump to toe circle
Double leg jam
seat circles
Basket swings
Down Swing

Clear Hips in a row
Wyler
GIANTS
The “up swing”
Many of the same drills as CLEAR HIPS
REVIEW
Maintain body shape
Opening of Arms
Toes lead the way
Neutral Head Position

DOWN SWING

Tkatchev Drill

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Tkatchev video drill from Arun Kumar Jayan in India. (Known to his friends in the west as Colin Zand)

This drill teaches how to maintain posture and body shape throughout the skill.

A mistake many coaches make is the implementation of drills like this TOO LATE. Drills like this should be taught and developed through time.

Share you drills with GYM MOMENTUM.

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