Nick Ruddock's Best Uneven Bar Dismount & Giant Tips

Save $1000 with our new Performance Course Bundles!
https://shiftmovementscience.com/bundles/

Unlock the secrets to mastering gymnastics skills with our special guest, Nick Ruddock, as he shares his insights on the art of coaching backward giants and flyaways. Renowned for his innovative educational techniques, Nick emphasizes the foundational importance of the backward giant and the critical role of physical preparation. Discover his "five dimensions of a straight line" model, a game-changing approach to maintaining a straight line across various positions—a key skill for any aspiring gymnast gearing up for competition season.

Get ready to rethink your training strategies with the "rotate and repeat" method, designed to help gymnasts maintain consistent shapes while enhancing their comprehension of bar skills. We delve into the Biles principles of sight, flight, shape, swing, and extension, with practical advice on how to apply these to backward giants and flyaways. Nick also addresses the significance of core strength and static shapes, offering a variety of exercises such as hollow holds and backward rolls that can significantly boost a gymnast's technical progression and performance.

From mastering the open tuck position to developing swing using innovative tools like the trapeze, we explore advanced coaching techniques that prioritize patient progression. Nick’s philosophy on deliberate skill development, including the 'catapult' effect, offers a fresh perspective on enhancing athlete performance through foundational readiness and precise timing. Join us for this rich conversation filled with expert insights and actionable tips that promise to elevate both coaching strategies and gymnast success.

We appreciate you listening!

To learn more about SHIFT, head here - https://shiftmovementscience.com/

To learn about SHIFT's courses, check our website here - https://courses.shiftmovementscience.com/

Also, please consider rating, reviewing, and sharing the podcast with your friends! 

Thanks :)

Thanks for listening to The SHIFT Show!

Check out SHIFT's most popular courses here!

https://courses.shiftmovementscience.com/

Want to join our online educational community of over 1000 gymnastics professionals and get 40+ hours of gymnastics lectures? Join The Hero Lab below!

https://shiftmovementscience.com/theherolab/

Check out all our past podcast episodes here!

https://shiftmovementscience.com/podcast/

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:18):
Hello everyone and welcome back to another episode
of the shift show, where mynumber one goal is to bring you
the tools, ideas and the latestscience to help you change
gymnast lives.
Today on the podcast, we arebringing you probably one of the
most highly watched and alsorequested topics, two things
together that people really wantto hear about.
One is anything from NickRuddick and two is bars,

(00:38):
dismounts and flyways, as wellas some giant work.
So these are just kind of youknow, nick.
Obviously it's just goldstandard for any sort of
educational work and things thathe delivers on are incredible
Good friend of mine.
Every time we have somethingfrom him on the podcast, people
get a ton of feedback andpositive reviews, so that's
great.
And then, obviously, nicktalking about technical work,
particularly bars, as we getcloser to season for dismounts,

(00:59):
flyaways, giants something thateverybody could use some
brushing up on, because itreally is the foundational work
for bars and so many peoplestruggle with it.
So I wanted to get some contentfrom Nick on here as we go into
the season, just because somany people want to hear about
it from him, and so this lectureactually comes from the shift
symposium which we had a coupleyears back, very popular day
long lectures was eight eightwomen's and eight men's lectures

(01:19):
in a row from just world classexperts.
So, nick Ruddick, we had achoreography beam lecturer, we
had some work from floor andtumbling and bounding from
Justin I'm trying to rememberall the ones we had just like an
incredible lineup of women'seight lectures and men's eight
lectures, and it was actuallypart of the three-day summit we
did.
And the reason I'm putting thislecture out now is because so
many people are asking me forjust like a bunch of content

(01:42):
together.
You know, I want to learn awhole bunch of great stuff from
drills and strength flexibility.
Just give me all the stuff thatI need for as a coach.
Or, if I'm a medical provider,give me all the stuff that I
need for medical providers andgive me all the stuff I need for
strength and conditioning.
And so during the week thatthis is coming out right now to
celebrate for Black Friday,we're actually doing a huge sale
of all of our performancebundles together.
So you can get five courses forthe price of one here, which

(02:03):
we've never done before, andyou're going to save $1,000 by
doing that.
So we wanted this because wewant people to have the
information they need on thatspecific topic.
So if you're a coach, you'regoing to get, you know, 100
hours of drills, skills,flexibility, power from me
myself, other people that we'veworked with from shift.
If you're a medical provider,you can get 100 hours of upper,
lower extremity, low back painall the things that I do in the

(02:25):
clinic.
And then also if you're astrength conditioning coach,
there's a bundle that gives you100 hours of strength, power,
flexibility, plyometrics,running, sprinting technique
everything we do at champion towork with gymnasts as well.
So if you want to check outthose bundles this week again
you can save $1,000, which ispretty wild, as I say it out
loud but shivmovementsciencecombackslash bundles.
We are giving that all this week.
It is live right now and a lotof people have been really

(02:45):
enjoying it.
So I want you guys to just chewon that and just kind of digest
that a bit.
Take on those bundles if youwant.
I feel like that's probably thebest thing we've ever offered
and you might benefit from that,or you are somebody you know
you might want to pick that upas a nice little holiday bonus
gift for them.
Maybe your gym can pay that,but if not.
I want you to enjoy thisawesome lecture with Nick
Ruddock from the Shift Symposium, which is actually one of the
courses in the bundle, so hopeyou all enjoy this great lecture

(03:07):
with Nick.

Speaker 2 (03:10):
Okay, back again, and this time we're going to be
talking about backward giantsand flyaways.
Got lots to get through, so doneed to move quite quickly.
But we'll just start by doing arecap on some principles and
probably introduce a few newones throughout this session too
.
We'll start with the backwardgiant, and it's worth just again
reminding ourselves that thisis a root skill, and what I mean

(03:30):
by that is that loads ofdifferent skills come from a
backward giant, whether it's ablind change, a full pirouette,
whether that's going to leadinto a dismount or release like
a ginger.
So it's absolutely imperativebecause obviously almost all
gymnasts will perform a giant.
We need to make sure we get itright, and if we don't get it
right, we place that technicalceiling above their head and

(03:54):
immediately just start closingthe doors and all the different
avenues and skills that ourgymnasts could possibly possibly
perform.
A giant is considered afoundational element.
I tend to avoid using the wordbasic element now, because I
find that things like backwardgiants, whilst they are quite
simple, they're not easy.
They're certainly not easy todo at a high performance

(04:15):
standard.
So these foundational skillsneed a significant investment in
time of time if we're going toget the end product looking how
we want it to look.
Okay, basically, great giantsdon't come by accident.
They come through verydeliberate technique, deliberate
practice, high amounts ofphysical preparation.
Now, one of the models that Iuse with all my sort of physical

(04:37):
preparation work is what I callthe five dimensions of a
straight line, and essentiallywhat this means is that I want
an athlete to be able todemonstrate a straight line.
Five different ways, verysubtle variations.
They should be able to do thatlying on their stomach, lying on
their back so that means theirback pressed towards the floor,
shoulders pressed completelystraight line and standing up
with the arms raised above theirhead, hanging on a bar and in

(05:01):
handstand.
Okay, we'll just go over thoseagain quickly.
Lying on the stomach, lying onthe back, standing up with the
arms raised, hanging in a barand in handstand the five
dimensions of a straight line.
That's something I want tostart working straight away, as
soon as these kids start cominginto the gym.
You've got to work on thosestraight lines Because, of
course, if an athlete doesn'thave the ability to demonstrate

(05:21):
straight lines, that's going toshow up as an issue technically
when it comes to well, basicallyeverything on bars, but
particularly backward giants.
So make sure that you areinvesting time in our
foundations, our basics of thebasics, our fundamental skills,
however you like to refer tothem as.
Okay, basics first, okay, cool.

(05:43):
What the concept that is is onethat I think I call rotate and
repeat.
Essentially, you've got oneshape and you're rotating it
into different positions.
So I've just mentioned fivedifferent ways of showing a
straight line, but actually theshape is just a straight line.
So you know, being on thestomach and the back, the shape
shouldn't change.
We're just rotating it orputting it in handstand.

(06:03):
We're rotating it again.
Hanging on a bar, standing up,rotating it, or putting it in
handstand.
We're rotating it again.
Hanging on a bar, standing up,rotating it again.
So we're just repeating theexercise through different
rotations, and I think that waywe enhance the athlete's
understanding of how todemonstrate that shape.
I'll use some other examples aswe go through the presentation
through different positions aswell, but I think this is just a
key thing for us to do ascoaches is, when you teach a

(06:24):
shape, rotate it and teach itagain, rotate it and teach it
again, and that way we shoulddevelop or enhance our athletes'
understanding of how to do thatin different positions.
Okay, so yeah, just a littlequick win for you there.
I've mentioned the Bilesprinciples in the earlier
presentation, so I'll just very,very quickly just mention those

(06:45):
here again Sight, flight, shape, swing and extension all
massively important for whatwe're talking about today, with
backward giants and flyaways.
The flyaway, specifically, we'regoing to be looking at flight,
aren't we for the very firsttime?
And don't forget therelationship that extension,
swing and shape are going tohave and the way that they're

(07:05):
going to impact flight as well.
So, extension being, can theathlete be as far away from the
bar as possible and raise thecenter of mass up?
We've got shape, becauseeverything in gymnastics,
particularly bars, is about howgood these shapes are and their
understanding of how totransition between them.
And then we've got swing.

(07:26):
We enhance the swing throughgreat shape and extension and
swing will develop flight.
So five principles make sureyou're aware of them, make sure
you're looking for them in thegym and you're coaching by them
all the time.
If your athlete can understandthese principles themselves,
you've just done a great job,because it will make your life a
lot easier and their lifeeasier.
They will transfer thoseprinciples to all the different

(07:48):
skills that you end up teaching.
That's exactly where we want tobe.
Let's make life easy forourselves, shall we?
So if we're thinking aboutgiants, let's look at some of
the shapes and the physicalpreparation activities which are
going to be important.
I love using the wall ladders,the wall bars.
I think they are justabsolutely imperative for great
bar development, and I mentionedthe strap bar earlier for the

(08:09):
circle session.
And again, this is anotherplace.
Spend your money.
Okay, don't need gadgets, youneed staple foundational
equipment.
A strap bar and a set of wallbars is just absolutely key if
you want a great bar,particularly if you're able to
get all your gymnasts or youknow at least half your gymnasts
working on them at the sametime and you can swap them over
with different exercises.

(08:30):
Things like a hollow hold here,um, just yeah, fundamental stuff
, but very, very important.
Arch positions yeah, absolutelykey, getting those right.
And then a hollow shape again.
So there's the rotate andrepeat concept.
We've got a hollow shape on thefloor and then we've got a
hollow shape on the bar.
It's the same shape.
We've just rotated it and, okay, she's hanging, but it's the

(08:51):
same shape.
So we're rotating that sameposition, but you'd be surprised
how many gym masters can do iton the floor but they won't be
able to do it on the bar.
It feels different.
They've actually got to use adifferent, you know, set of
muscles to make sure thatthey're showing the right shape,
because they're not just staticresting against the floor.

(09:12):
Now They've got to moreactively pull themselves into
position.
So rotate and repeat, very,very important for us to do.
It goes without saying.
If these static shapes arecompromised, we're not going to
see them through motion.
Okay, you know, our gymnastsneed to have great core strength
, they need to have greathandstands, great understanding
of these basic, fundamentalshapes If we are to expect them
to be able to transition thatover to the bar itself through

(09:35):
motion.
So always look at how wellprepared your athletes are
physically, as you know.
That's going to give you cluesbasically to maybe why,
technically, they could be,could be struggling or they
could have plateaued or orsomething like that.
Okay, cool, right, so let's getinto some uh progressions,
shall we?
And uh, we've got here again.
I've showed this um videoalready a backward roll to a

(09:57):
kind of a candle position orshoulder stand position.
We do this because we want themto understand how to keep the
chest in and the head in as theyroll backwards.
We want them to understandapplying pressure back on the
floor without compensating ormoving this kind of thoracic
part of the body.
Okay, very, very important anda great prerequisite although

(10:18):
it's arguably harder than doingthis kind of work which is your
backward roll to front supports.
Okay, so again you'll, you'llsee, hopefully no change in that
head position there.
Yeah, completely still again,great exercise for your toe,
arms, your shoulders, but alsoyour back, with giants, that

(10:40):
ability to press back on thefloor.
You know, apply that pressure.
But just look at what shapeshe's actually going through
here.
You know she's going throughthose same hollow positions
we've looked at.
There's the rotate and repeat.
Again.
She's in a support now, butbefore she's on her back and
then she's on the wall bars.
It's the same shape we're doingright, and it's almost the same

(11:02):
shape.
Here as she rolls, there's thathollow again, albeit a little
bit deeper.
So that's why static shapes areimportant, because we're always
going through those positionsin motion and that's how we get
to having, you know, just greatbackward roller hand stands,
which is hopefully what you'reseeing here.
Okay, now I look at that and Isay that to me has got a bit of

(11:22):
flight.
She doesn't actually leavefloor but because that lightness
and that bounce that only comesthrough extension and shape and
I think it just gives it alittle bit of flight.
So I really like that.
But again, look at thediscipline that she's got here.
Ok, keeping that headabsolutely still.
Yeah, really, really niceexample Do the work on the floor
, it will expedite everythingthat you're doing on the actual

(11:45):
bar itself.
Okay, now we're going to move tojust a few exercises, just for
demonstrative purposes.
Again, what we call in Europe acorvette action and I know this
isn't widely used in America ifyou're watching this in the
sort of stateside over the pondbut the corvette is a transition
between an arch and a dish.
It's like a snap action.
It's the same action you'd seein a round off or the block off

(12:08):
the table in Iachenko and we usethat, of course, in a backward
giant.
We transition from arch tohollow or arch to dish.
So we can set that up in loadsof different ways.
And again, what you're seeinghere now or going to see is this
rotate and repeat concept.
You're going to see me thiscase, this is Charlotte doing it

(12:28):
here on the bar.
You're then going to seeCharlotte doing it here.
So we've got the same action.
We've rotated there at adifferent angle, so I want to
check that she understands it.
We're also going to see it hereflat.
Okay, these are all differentways of just training that
transition between a hollow andan arch, hollow and a dish, or
arch and a dish.

(12:48):
I should say Um and so.
Again, it goes without sayingif those static shapes aren't
right, even for the bodyalignment or just general shape,
then it's just not going to begreat when it goes through
motion.
Get your static positions rightfirst and we can start to make
that more dynamic with these.
I think these are commonlyknown as fish swings, maybe fish

(13:10):
kicks, but again, it's thattransition.
So again, this is kind of likesimple stuff in the sense of
it's not complex to teach.
It's not complex probably tounderstand what we're looking
for as coaches.
But it doesn't mean that ourgymnasts are always very good at
it.
And I think that again, is thedistinguished difference between
what's simple and easy.

(13:33):
This is all very simple.
It doesn't mean your gymnastscan do it easily.
So invest time in it If yourathletes, when you've asked them
to do it through yourassessments, have got gaps.
Uh, if, if your athletes, whenyou've asked them to do it
through your assessments, havegot gaps, fill those gaps.
Do that first.
That's going to help bars morethan more than anything else.
Okay, back to our floor baragain.
So think, yeah, again, thingslike backward leans.

(13:54):
Um, now, those that follow mywork, or maybe you're, you're a
part of my uh membership program, the gymnastics growth academy,
and you would have seen, seen,we've got dozens of exercises
like this in in exerciselibraries and um, essentially,
you know, in the daily dozenanother one of my physical
preparation models there'salways um handstand based

(14:14):
exercises, there's alwaysopening shoulder exercises.
You've just got to create yourown formula by compiling a menu
of exercises that you're doingdaily.
That will enhance performance.
So, in the daily dozen, there'salways a rope climb, always a
chin up, always a press, forexample, there's always a
handstand, a corvette exercise.
These are things done everysingle training day, and so an

(14:35):
exercise like this would beincluded also why?
Because it speeds up learning.
You know, you invest time inthe physical, it enhances
learning elsewhere and and youcan see again, jada, just
getting that understanding ofkeeping the chest, in applying
pressure back on the bar,extending, et cetera, et cetera.
Why?
Because I don't want to teachthat on the bar.
I want that, that bit to beautomatic, underpinned by all

(14:58):
this stuff here on the floor.
Ok, cool, all right, let's getinto some more shapes Now.
I'm a massive fan of an opentuck position for teaching quite
a lot of skills actually, inboth acrobatics and on bars.
But one of them is the giant,okay, and actually the flyaway,
which you'll see in a fewminutes time.

(15:19):
This shape is not a simple oneor an easy one for the gymnast
to understand actually.
So, whilst it is a, in someways, a regression of a standard
dish shape, many athletesactually find the concept of
keeping the knee bent but thehip flat quite tricky to
understand.
So I'm not going to lie to youand say that this is a shortcut,
not going to sayseven-year-olds will learn how

(15:40):
to do an open tuck like this.
I don't think that's the case,but I do think it's worthwhile
still.
It has some benefits which I'llcome on to, but again, you're
going to see, rotate and repeat.
I want to show, or I want tohave the athlete understand this
open tuck position, in thiscase hanging, you know, facing
and away.
Again, evie here doing afantastic job.

(16:01):
We've got Freya here, inverted,doing it in more of a candle
position.
We've got it against the wallhere, okay, so rotate and repeat
, it works, guys.
Let's just keep this simpleFind a shape, nail it in all
sorts of different angles andthen transfer it to the
apparatus.
Let's keep this as simple aspossible, whilst always teaching

(16:21):
those five concepts.
So, you know, we start with astatic open tuck and then again
we've got to use motion as well.
And you know, pretty much justusing the same exercises before
Backward rolls to an open tuck,backward roll to handstand, you
know, in the candle position, totry and develop their
understanding of it.

(16:41):
I personally think it's justjust very, very valuable, okay,
um, so what you're going to seenext?
What you're going to see nextis just a few different
exercises.
I don't have a load, because Ithink that I'm sure everyone
watching this has got a reallygood understanding of how to
teach swings.
What I want to do is just makesure that you leave this session
probably looking for thoseprinciples a bit more and maybe

(17:05):
with a slightly differentapproach, but I'm just going to
show you I think five, fivevideos here and these are kind
of extracts from my masterclasses.
Now I'm going to talk over them.
I've taken the audio out but,as you probably know, I run a
series of live coach educationevents a year.
They're called master classes.
They're all on the website andthings and this is where we've
pulled the content out from,just if you're curious.
And in this session, to startwith, I was just talking about

(17:27):
the ways that the spotting, theway that you spot, can influence
what the gymnast does.
So what you can see here isthat I've got one hand helping
make sure that she's in thebeautiful rounded position.
I've got my other hand, ofcourse, on her legs.
That just helps physically holdher.
But I'm also using that handand kind of kicking it back a

(17:50):
bit to give her a cue.
There's my cue that I'm givingher of when she should initiate,
roughly at this age stage, the,the hang.
So I was just talking hereabout the, the importance of
where we place our hands, andalso, you can see, I'm applying
pressure at the back of theshoulder again to influence the
fact that I want that shoulderto open, because it's not just
the back and the hips thatgenerate swing.
I want the shoulder to initiateit as well, which is exactly

(18:13):
what's happening here.
Okay, so I've got a bit ofpressure there.
I've got a bit of pressure inthe back of the head that keeps
the head still, stops it frommoving, but also is her cue of
when to guide, and you can seeshe's actually doing a very nice
job here at swinging through.
Okay, now I like to teach swingswith the bar at this kind of
height as much as I can.

(18:33):
So if I'm at floor level, sonot standing on a platform or a
block, and I am able to kind oflift the athlete in this way, I
personally just find it easierfor my back and I think that's
really, really important whenyou're coaching lots of gymnasts
.
You know, typically at this age, if you're working with swings,
you're probably teaching themat six, seven, eight, nine years

(18:54):
old, for example, where you'veprobably got big groups, and so
you need a way of spotting and asetup which protects you as
opposed to exposes you to sortof back problems there.
So that's what we were doingthere.
Again, metal bar is your bestfriend the strap bar when it
comes to teaching giants, and Icertainly wouldn't want to teach
them without one.
Okay, another way of me doingthat is this kind of spot here.

(19:18):
Again, I find it relativelysimple doing this and easy on my
back, and I'm able to put herinto really nice shapes.
You'll notice, in both examplesthat I've used, I'm always
again pausing to make sure thatshe understands the shape and
I'm just doing that qualitycontrol check.
Ok, so, is she extended?
Is the back rounded?
Is she looking at the rightplace, which could later be

(19:40):
towards her feet or the floor,for example?
So very important that we dothese little static shapes and
that's why, again, finding a waythat you can spot comfortably
is great, because it allows youto be able to do that, whereas
if you're not comfortable oryou're overextending or you're
folding over in half, you're notable to do your static checks.
It's just too much work foryour body and you're going to

(20:03):
end up hurting yourself.
Okay, but again, I'm just doinga different kind of spotting
action here and you can see I'mbeing quite clever with my hands
by manipulating, guiding her,by just sort of pulling the legs
back before I let her go.
Okay, again, just this is simplestuff, right, you don't?

(20:25):
You look at this, it's notcomplex, but be honest with you,
it's hard work, and that'sprobably going to be the
difference between great bars ata young age and not.
It's like how hard is the coachwilling to work?
How much energy are theywilling to invest in the
spotting and the handling of theskills and the?
You know, you know manipulatingpositions.
You just need a great workethic.
So I always say, if you're notsweating as much as the athlete

(20:47):
when you come off bars, youmight not have worked hard
enough.
Potentially, uh.
Either that or you're extremelyeffective at creating drills
and progressions which arecompletely independent and still
enhance learning, and if that'sthe case, you know I'm all ears
.
I bow down to you.
There are coaches out therethat do a better job at that
than me, for sure.
Okay, now we're going tointroduce the open tuck position

(21:09):
from the swing and you'llnotice that the way that I start
this you might have noticedthere is I didn't actually ask
her to do anything, but justhold a static position, so I
mentioned this for the toe-ons.
One thing I don't like is whenthey just they start in
handstand.
I see a lot of coaches do this.
They start in handstand andthey just use the fact that
they've got momentum to createenergy, and we don't want to do

(21:30):
that.
We want the gymnast to firstunderstand swing and timing and
later on add the energy.
Okay, for the momentum fromhandstand.
They've got to understandtechnique first.
Okay, that is exceptionallyimportant.
So what we've done here is we'veput her into the static
position, always underneath thebar, okay, and then I'm asking

(21:51):
her to stay there.
Don't do an action, just see ifshe can hold that in a rigid
position.
Then I ask her to now do theaction, so you'll see, you'll
see her start to go through thatwas a static one and you'll
start to see her now actuallygoing through an arch.
So there's her hang.
Okay, we'll just go back againand play that one more time.

(22:13):
So, static hold, show beautifulshapes.
I think she did an exceptionaljob at that.
And there's the kick.
Okay, arch kick.
Good, now my hand again is onthe head.
It's a great place for me to beable to get control.
I'm contradicting myself alittle bit here, because I'm now
bent down, folded over in halfon a block, but I find it just

(22:36):
very difficult to find adifferent way of doing this.
But you can see my hand thereis is ready for her and I'm
going to apply that gentlepressure again to make sure she
doesn't tip the head back.
Um, yeah, and she, she knowsexactly what.
What I want from her, again,chest is in also, because my
hand's on the back of her head.
It's able to make sure she'sable to show this nice,
beautiful body line here.

(22:57):
Okay, just let that play.
And then that last one younotice, I just took her over the
bar.
Okay, so static, hold, checkthe shape.
Okay, just let that play.
And then that last one younotice, I just took her over the
bar.
Okay, so, static, hold, checkthe shape.
Introduce some gentle swingswith no action.
Then she's doing the kick.
I'm just checking all the time.

(23:17):
I'm asking her to guide withher knees first, and then, if
I'm happy, as long as I'm happy,the last one, I just take her
over the bar.
She didn't really have to doanything more there.
I'm the one that's guiding herover, but that's the key shape
there.
That's the key shape that weneeded to understand.
Okay, and you'll notice thatkey shape there as well, okay,

(23:39):
so again, if we haven't got thatone statically, and they
haven't understood what thatfeels like, you know what the
cues are, with like kneesleading, then it's going to be
very difficult to be able to gether to do that elsewhere also.
Um, okay, let's have anotherlook.
This is actually a differentvideo than the one that you've
just seen.
It looks similar but it'sdifferent.
So you can see there's a moreaggression here, uh, more more

(24:03):
dynamic action, and I'm nowtaking her um up to handstand on
both sides.
Now I call these fail giantsbecause we're not going over the
bar, we're going up tohandstand and we're going back
again.
I think I probably will sendher over for the last one.
Let's have a look.
There we go.
I know that's not the last one,I'm sure the last one.

(24:24):
I normally end up with abackward giant.
There we go, okay, but all ofthose before that stage what we
refer to as fail giants.
So it's again a quality controlcheck.
We check both sides swinging upgood shape, swinging back good
shape.
Up, good shape, back, goodshape.
And it stops her from thinkingabout, stops the gymnast from
thinking about just going over,because that's not what we want.

(24:45):
I want multiple opportunitiesto check the shape and position.
I'll pause it.
I mean, look at that, that isjust a beautiful shape.
She's only only been able to dothat through through great
coaching from her coaches, amberand jade, at revolution
gymnastics, and she's.
You know that is deliberate,you don't get there by accident.
Okay, very, very deliberatework so you can see that a real,

(25:06):
real good extension.
The hip is absolutely flat, thechest is in.
I'm loving that.
Um, that that's what I want herto feel.
If you just pass them over thebar sorry, just pass them over
the bar really fast they won'tfeel that extension because they
don't feel the support phasefor long enough.
And so again, like, okay, itmight be hard work, but it's
absolutely worth the investmentof time making sure that you do

(25:30):
that stuff.
Okay, okay, now the next one.
You'll notice the bar is highernow and what we're doing in
this video is I'm asking her toactually do the hang kick with
straight legs and then she tapsto bent legs.
So, if you watch closely enough,with straight legs and then she
taps to bent legs.
So, if you watch closely enough, straight legs, straight, open
tuck.
So the open tuck happens rightat the very end.
Now, this is a progression thatI actually often use on the,

(25:53):
the single rail itself.
You might have gymnasts thatare so close to learning their
giants, but they're just notquite there.
So by doing this action instead, which is that they they kick
to a bent, you are shorteningthe body, which accelerates
their rotation around the bar,because obviously we know that
the longer the body is, theslower it's going to rotate.
There's more resistance, isn'tthere against the body.

(26:15):
Okay, so we've got a straightleg hang here, straight legs
here, straight legs here, andthen she's tapping to the open
tuck and that just speeds it up.
Now, it's worth noting.
I probably should havementioned this, but in an open
tuck, we don't want a closed hip.
It's not a traditional tuck,it's an open tuck.
So we don't want a closed hip.
Absolutely no, that's going tocause problems later on, which

(26:37):
is why I said earlier at thebeginning, it's actually really
difficult to teach an open tuckeffectively to young kids,
because they do tend to closethe hip, but what you're seeing
here from evie is an open one.
That's beautiful.
So so the leg is bent 90degrees, but everything else is
just your traditional hollowposition.
It's a hollow position withbent legs, as opposed to a tuck
position, okay.
So, uh, just to make sure whenyou're, when you're watching

(26:59):
these exercises, you'rerecognizing that and, again,
she's doing a great job.
Now, when you're at this stagehappy days, spend a load of time
there.
Obviously, I'm spotting this.
You then want to do itindependently on the strap bar
as well, and then I've used thiswith a number of gymnasts to
transfer over to doing giants onthe actual rail itself.

(27:21):
I've also used very effectivelymany times that open tuck to
teach turns, to teaching yourblind changes with that, because
it helps the gymnast tounderstand turning the knees,
and a lot of gymnasts strugglewith that.
They struggle with with turningthe knees, okay, so that's a
great little exercise to do.
Okay, right, let's keep onmoving.

(27:41):
Uh, just going back to the solecircle again, because the the
backward giant involves a wristshift.
The sole circle should be aprerequisite to a backward giant
, so I would like gymnasts to beable to do straight arm not
straight leg, but straight armsole circles on their own before
learning a backward giant.
That way, I know that they knowhow to shift their wrists with

(28:04):
straight arms, head in goodextension, and they're obviously
all the boxes that you need totick for the backward giant as
well.
So there's a good chance you'llbe able to do that with your
kids.
That's sort of, you know, eight, nine years old that might be
before they actually learn theirbackward giant on the bar.
I've certainly had kids asyoung as eight.
Do you know sets of 10 soulcircles on their own,
independently, on a low bar nota metal bar, but a regular bar

(28:28):
and do them very, very well lowbar, not a metal bar, but a
regular bar and do them very,very well.
Now you remember that one ofthe principles that I talk about
here is swing, and swing beingextremely important.
Fantastic bar workers are justvery, very good at developing
swing, and one concept that I'vebeen introducing into some of
my masterclass clinics which Iknow a lot of people have been
able to watch and they've sharedtheir own gymnasts doing this

(28:49):
exercise is the use of a trapeze.
Um, you know, trapeze isswinging and what I think that?
Well, maybe you'll agree withme that young kids just struggle
to swing on bars becausethey're small, uh, and their
hands are small and the bar isquite fat for the size of their
hands, and so, um, swinging isjust really difficult, and
particularly the sensation ofswinging, and what I want to do

(29:12):
is find a way and the trapezedoes that of developing and
connecting with them thesensation of swinging.
And that's what we're doinghere and you know it basically
gives them a long amount of timeto go through those positions.
And you know, know, I shouldalso said, like nothing that
I've shown you today in terms ofthe technique is perfect.

(29:33):
So we could say, well, thisgymnast could, um, could, hang a
bit earlier and a bit more.
Yeah, of course she's learning,she's only like eight years old
, um, but you, you're gettingthe idea she's got here a
massive amount of time to beable to feel those shapes, and
you just don't tend to get thatwith younger kids when they're
first learning to swing.
And if we take a look here atGeorgia Mae again, you'll see,

(29:55):
if you think about the parallelbetween what you just saw on the
trapeze and here.
It's the same there's loads oftime Georgia Mae's feeling the
sensation of swinging, but youwon't get that, you won't get
this from a kid this youngunless you use a trapeze.
In my opinion, or you know,they're doing like 40 hours a

(30:16):
week training at seven years old, which is obviously not
something that I advocate.
Okay, so, um, a trapeze is, isfun, it brings some fun to
gymnastics, it teaches swing, um, and, and it's playful.
You know, what more could youwant?
I think that's a really goodinvestment of time.
And so let's just take a look atsort of Georgia Mays actually
her backward giants because shedoes a great job again of

(30:40):
extension.
If you look around the headthere on the way up you don't
see her ears whatsoever.
You've got a beautiful straightarm wrist shift.
Okay, and this is very much theangle that I would be
encouraging you to look at yourgymnast's shift of the wrist to
check how they're getting on.
But if we look at what'shappening here, you know just
absolutely beautiful headposition, that little bounce on

(31:02):
the bar, which to me is like theessence of flight, it's a
lightness, and of course, thebar hanging down very, very
nicely as well.
So, um, you know we've talked alot about extension being
important in support.
So when the athlete is on topof the bar but underneath the
bar, it's just as important.
So we've got this support phaseand we've got this bit here that
we're seeing now, which is whatwe call the hang phase, and you

(31:25):
can see again that georgia mayis hanging very low down to the
floor and that still makes surethe center of mass is as far
away from the bar as possibleand you can see it loads the bar
.
It kind of pulls the bar downand that helps to uh on the
upswing, because obviously theopposite to the bar pulling down
is that the bar then lifts herup.
It gives her a bit of a bit ofa kick on the way up as well.

(31:46):
So let's just watch theseanother time.
I just love watching simple,simple skills done beautifully
well.
I mean, these are just greatgiants.
So completely neutral headposition, beautiful straight arm
, lovely wrist shift, greatbounce on the bar.
Okay, happy days.
Okay.
So that's the backward giantthere and, as I said, there's

(32:07):
going to be more progressions.
There's going to be some moreindependent things that you
could be doing as well.
Um, what I wanted to make surethat you you understood was my
kind of concept of using theopen tuck and again thinking
about the uh, the principles ofextension and shape to enhance
swing and flight.
So we're going to use that nowbecause we're going to look at
the fly away, uh, again, aseries of progressions and just
like um, well, I guess that likethe toe on a lot of

(32:28):
progressions and just like well,I guess, like the Toe-On, a lot
of this stuff's quiterepetitive.
You know you don't need amassive variation of different
drills, so what I'm going toshow you is not rocket science
Very, very simple, just goodprinciples, done well, with lots
of repetition.
That's all you need.
You don't need shiny objects,you need stuff that's been
around for a long, long time andhas been working very
effectively.

(32:49):
So let's just take a look, tostart with, at one of the most
important exercises, of course,which is coming from a swing.
So, again, if you don't teachyour gymnast how to swing
properly, these preparationsbecome quite complex and
difficult.
Okay, another benefit of, or,yeah, reason why you should be

(33:11):
teaching good swings.
But here we're looking at acandlestick or a shoulder stand,
and I'm showing you twodifferent ways of spotting this.
This first way is is mypreference, which is grabbing
the wrists or the forearms, asyou can see here now.
It's my preference because Ifind it a lot easier for me in
terms of like, I don't need tospot.
Um, well, I don't need tostress my back out.
Again, I can do, you know,hundreds of these, even with
bigger gymnasts from than whatyou're seeing here from Evie.
It develops a lot ofindependence because actually

(33:32):
I'm only holding the forearm.
Therefore she needs to be incontrol of where her body is, so
where her feet are pointing,how open her shoulder angle is.
Like I'm not doing any of thatherself.
And also, as you'll see later,it's not very restrictive,
because it's not restrictive tohow high I can hold her.
She's able to take that swingreally, really high.
So what we're trying to do isto develop this static position,

(33:55):
but in the air again, and wewould develop this statically
first.
We want to get this right Openshoulder angle, hip up high but
not overextended chest in.
And the visual cue here is wewant her to be looking at her
feet.
We must remember that in everyskill there's a deliberate place
to look and on bars, just likeevery other apparatus, sight is

(34:16):
important.
Okay, so looking at the feetwill enhance technique, give her
more confidence and improvecertainly safety as well.
For this particular skill, okay, we'll just look at the other
way of spotting, which I thinkis less back-friendly, certainly

(34:37):
gives you more control over theathlete.
I don't discount that I'm ableto grab her and I physically got
her Now to do that isexhausting.
I can't do that for a whole barsession with loads of gymnasts.
That's a lot harder.
But also she feels like I'mwhat I call cradling her, like
I've got more of her.
That feels less independent,and less independence is going

(34:59):
to not develop the same level ofconfidence.
The more independent she is,the more in control she will
feel, as opposed to beingreliant on me.
So I don't like this spot verymuch personally.
I have used it.
I will continue to use it everynow and then, but the wrist
support is my, is my go-to, it'smy favored one.
Um, cool, so we're startingwith hardly any power.

(35:22):
Again, don't start from cast.
Don't don't start from giants.
Whatever you do, start fromyour swings and then develop
into your cast.
So here we're doing exactly thesame progressions and we're
just going a bit higher.
And what she's now got to do ismake adjustments as to where
she's hanging.
You know where that tap is, howhard she's got to tap, how much
of this is just momentum versushow much energy she's got to

(35:43):
give.
And the way that I like to thinkabout this from a coach
development perspective is thereshould always be an action.
There is always an action.
It might be a subtle one, itmight be a soft one, but there
is always an action taking place.
If you were, you might playgolf, and if you don't play golf
, you certainly know how golfworks.
You've got a golf ball andyou've got a club and you've got

(36:06):
to hit the ball as far as youcan.
In order to do that, you do apre-action, so you draw your
arms back behind you and thenyou follow through to hit the
ball, same way that you kick afootball or a soccer ball you
draw your leg back and then youcomplete the action and you kick
through.
It's the same thing, sameprinciple, when it comes to the
way we swing bars.
Now I can draw my arms back,not much to hit a golf ball.

(36:33):
I can go back a little bit, Ican go back loads.
I could hit the ball hard, Icould hit the ball soft, but
there is an action, and so whatwe've got to do, and what Evie
here's got to do, is just figureout that timing that hang is
going to be.
I'll go in clockwise, which isopposite to the way that she's
doing here.
That hang is probably going tobe around 20 past 25 past on the
clock.
Okay, that's where she's goingto be initiating that hang.

(36:55):
If it's too early, if it's likea quarter pass, she's going to
finish it early.
If it's too late, that couldcause problems when it comes to
the direction of the flyaway.
But somewhere around the 20pass mark is going to be.
Um, you know it, it can beperfect.
It's going to hopefully set usup for a successful release
position.
Ok, so the message here wasabout her developing her

(37:18):
independence and being able toadjust timing when we go from
swings to cast and start toincrease the heights of the cast
.
I'll play this again a coupleof times.
There we go play this again acouple of times.
There we go and, uh, yeah,she's in that learning phase of

(37:38):
doing it.
We've got it here as well.
Slightly different this isfreya, but again, just different
environment, same exercise.
The good thing is you don'tneed pits here, okay, but again,
what I'm doing there is I'mtaking her, I mean mean just
just just above the elbow, maybeon the elbow, and one of them,
um, but she's getting a greatunderstanding here of vision.
She's looking for her toes.
She's got the hip up, but notextended.

(37:59):
What I mean by that.
If we don't want an arch shape,the shoulder angle is nice and
open.
Okay, I can do, I can dohundreds of those without any
issue, and I can lift her rightabove my head.
I'm not really holding herweight, I'm just, you know,
influencing direction just very,very slightly.
And then, of course, she's gotto understand how to safely fall
onto her back.
Okay, good stuff.

(38:20):
Okay, we're going to justdevelop that slightly.
We've got to use Freya again.
So we want to introduce somerotation now and just breaking
it down Very, very simple.
You could do this on a wedge.
We're doing this with a channelpit, because we've got the
luxury of that in this fantasticfacility, but, yeah, just doing
the candlestick shoulder standposition into a backward roll.
What we're trying to do is gether Freya in this case to commit

(38:43):
.
We want her to commit tolooking at her feet.
We want her to commit to goingto the shoulder stand.
And when you develop theirconfidence through repetition,
like good reps, that's whatyou'll get.
You'll get a commitment fromthem.
If they're scared, they willnot commit to hitting a shoulder
stand.
Now you might think, well, youdon't need much commitment here.
She's only landing on her back,you're right.
Okay, but that is aprerequisite this one to this

(39:06):
next exercise I'm showing younow, okay which is that she's
going to do her swings Again.
I think I've probably got acradle spot here, cradle and
then flip.
So again, this is her having tocommit to that position.
Now, again, I don'tparticularly like doing this
because I think it's veryintensive on the back.
There is the benefit that bystopping, we get the quality

(39:27):
control and making sure thatshe's looking at at the right
place, and it's a nice littlebreakdown for her so she doesn't
become scared again of uh, ofjust just kind of flipping.
What we don't want, of course,is that they just move the head
back, which is, you know, it's aflipping skill, so most, most
athletes will do that.
A much better way of doing thatis to do a double spot, which is
again what you're what you'reseeing here.

(39:48):
This is amber, one of thepersonal coaches from revolution
that you've seen working withall of these athletes.
Uh, almost almost all the gmsthat you've seen have come from
revolution, and amber is, uh,alongside jade, one of the
personal coaches you'll see here.
A lovely position now, becausethere's two of us spotting.
We don't have to bend over asmuch.
We're not carrying as muchweight.
It's a lot easier.
Uh, and again, all we're doingis asking her to commit.

(40:10):
Commit to shoulder stand, we'lldo the rest.
Commit to shoulder stand, we'lldo the rest.
She's done a great job of that.
And when they become morecompetent, we start to just make
that more fluid.
There's less pausing.
So again, commit to shoulderstand, she commits, and we take
her over.
Okay, now, one thing I found tobe really useful in the teaching
process for these skills isgoing through a sequence.

(40:35):
So you might start with acandlestick, so you might go to
the wrists and that's let's saythat's drill A, okay, and then B
is we go candlestick, pause,check the position, flip that's
exercise B.
And then we do this one thatyou're seeing here is, which we
still ask evie to commit to thatposition, but we just go

(40:56):
straight away through it withoutany real pausing and now we've
got a sequence and we can go abc, abc, abc, and what that does
is connect the dots betweenthose different drills and
continually reminds the athleteof the importance of thinking
about, in this case, thecandlestick position.
Okay, because the candle is thefirst drill and we stop there

(41:18):
in the second one.
So we really want them to feelthat in this exercise.
So, to give her the best chance, we go through that sequence.
It would be a mistake, I believe, when you're first teaching
this, to just go C, c, c, c, c.
So basically back away, backaway, back away, back away.
Ok, so just just bear that inmind.
Factor that in when you'redoing your work.
Go through a logical sequence,ok.

(41:40):
Now you might look at this as astep back in terms of
performance, because it's goingto look a bit flat.
But again, really, reallyimportant to get them to be able
to swing back away and swingback away on their own.
Okay, I teach a double backfrom swings.
Okay.
So ideally an athlete would beable to perform a double back,

(42:01):
somersault, from three swings,for example.
Why?
Because I want them tounderstand it's the action, the
tap basically, of the hand kickthat develops the rotation and
the energy, and not the momentumcoming from handstand.
So far, all these drills andprogressions, you haven't seen a
single one from handstand.
They've all come from swing ora cast.
Very intentional, take away thepower, enhance technique or

(42:23):
develop the understanding oftechnique and then give them
that power to work withafterwards, or develop the
understanding of technique andthen give them that power to
work with afterwards.
But again, freya's doing agreat job here.
Again, look, I'm able to spotnicely from the floor by raising
the shoulder and we should seethat same shape on release.
Hang looks at the feet verynicely and let's go with the bar

(42:45):
.
That's an interesting pointactually.
I hear a lot of coaches saythrow the bar, like throw the
bar, throw the bar.
That's an interesting pointactually.
I hear a lot of coaches saythrow the bar Like throw the bar
, throw the bar.
I don't see it as a throw.
I mean, when I'm watching thisI just see her let go, like
throwing, to me is quite aerratic action.
It's, it's literally openingthe shoulders.
I don't want the shoulders toopen any more than they are on

(43:05):
the front swing.
I just want them to release thehands.
And everything else is donethrough timing timing of the of
the hang, timing of the kick,timing of letting go of the
hands.
But there isn't really aanother action.
There's not a throat.
Just the way I, way I view theworld, doesn't mean I'm right.
Okay, now we're back to myfavoured open tuck position

(43:26):
again.
The beauty of this is, if theathlete is able to demonstrate
this nice shape and swingproperly, it's just easy to spot
.
Again, you know I'm on the lowbar.
I wouldn't be teaching a flyaway from a tuck.
It's an an open tuck.
So remember, the differencethere is that the tuck is a
closed hip and the open tuckhere doesn't have a closed hip.
It has, uh, an open hip, whichis exactly what you're seeing

(43:48):
there.
Okay, so we can just do do thesame positions and because I'm
at a bar level or it's up to myshoulders, I'm just able to spot
this really easily and then Ican develop into this
preparation here which, again,is just a personal favorite of
mine.
You'll notice again that thehand on the back of the head
I'll play this quickly and thenI'll play it slowly again but a

(44:13):
very intentional hand here atthe back of the head to prevent
her from moving the head.
Simple as that.
It's there just to enhance hershape and understanding, kind of
force her into not doing thewrong thing.
Okay, and then we've got anexample here again from a cast,
and that's Freya now doing it.
Cast straight into a flyaway.
Nice position, good positionhere in the learning stages.

(44:39):
Okay.
Now, when it comes to doing theactual, your giants into it, I
just do the same thing.
Giant, giant shoulder standwith the wrists.
Giant, giant flyaways.
We still want the action there,but we want it to be soft.
But I tell you, the mostimportant thing about this skill
got to take your time.
You're going to, you're goingto feel like you're teaching the
skill for months and you willbe, if you're doing it right.

(45:00):
You will be Loads ofrepetitions, loads of
candlesticks, loads of exerciseswhere hopefully they can kind
of pause to feel that positionbefore rotating, because if you
don't have their trust and theconfidence, you're just going to
really struggle teaching theskill effectively.
Okay, so do take your time Now.
I hope those examples have beenuseful to you.

(45:21):
I just want to finish off withtwo other kind of philosophies
of my teachings that I like toshare with coaches, and one is
the accumulation effect, andwhat I mean by this is I want
you to think about a recipe likea food recipe and all the
different ingredients that gointo it.
So let's take pasta.
You might make pasta, and pastain itself is just one
ingredient and you can eat it onits own and it tastes all right

(45:42):
.
But actually you probably wantto add something else to it.
So it might be seasoning, saltand pepper, garlic, for example,
and then you might want to goand elevate that again by adding
some fresh tomatoes or somebasil basil, if you're in
America.
Okay, what we're able to do iselevate a core ingredient by
adding extra things to it, andwe don't want to add too many

(46:05):
things, because then it justbecomes a bit too messy.
We've made it too complex.
There's a sweet spot of takingsomething pretty simple and
enhancing it through theaddition of certain aspects, in
this case, ingredients whenyou're assessing the
effectiveness of the work thatyour gymnasts are doing and
you're trying to improve, let'ssay, a backward giant, for
example.
I want you to think about allthe different things that are
contributing to that.

(46:25):
It's not just the drills thatyou use, but it's their ability
to handstand, it's their levelsof confidence, it's the physical
preparation that you've done,it's their core strength, it's
their shoulder mobility.
These are all different thingswhich will accumulate to the
outcome of a good or badbackward giant.
So, when you're looking atimproving a skill, think about
first, well, what are the thingsthat are actually impacting it?

(46:48):
It's not always just the drills.
There's normally a lot moreother things as well.
So that was one thing that Ijust wanted to make sure I
mentioned.
Okay, there is a lot of thingsdeveloping your backward giants
and your flyaways Okay.
So just think about all theperipheral items as well.
The accumulative effect of themwill give you an outcome Okay.
And the next thing, the finalthing, is this concept of

(47:09):
catapult coaching, which I'vekind of made up.
I guess this is that sometimeswe need to draw someone back in
order to propel them forwards.
So you might find that you'veseen presentations either from
myself through this symposium,or many of the other fantastic
experts sharing their expertiseand you might be like you know

(47:29):
my gymnasts, I need to take themback.
Don't worry about that.
We've all done it.
I've done it loads.
Sometimes you go too fast andyou don't realize that you know
you're actually having theathlete try the skill and you're
like I've gone too quickly.
The handstand stuff that I'vetalked about might resonate with
you.
Good, so pull back a bit.
Go back, do more physical prep,get the shapes right, and by

(47:50):
doing that, what you're actuallydoing like a catapult is
propelling your gymnastsforwards.
They will improve rapidly, atprobably a much better rate than
they are now, if you draw backand just take a bit more time
filling in the gaps, which isstopping their development from
moving forwards.
And that is what I wanted tosay.
Look just.
Thank you so much for watchingthese presentations.
I hope they've been useful toyou.

(48:11):
I wish you every success, ofcourse, in your coaching journey
and please enjoy the rest ofthe symposium.
Thanks so much for watching.