Preventing Rips

[M23K's]

My daughter quit competitive gymnastics last May. She's now taking a rec class that's an hour and half long. They don't do bars every class.

In March/April she's going back to team and will be practicing 13 hours a week. I can't imagine what that jumps going to do to her hands!!

Does anyone know if something could be done at home to help her toughen them up?


Thanks!!

[lannamavity]

Instead of "toughening them up", you may want to have her remove any extra skin/callouses on her hand with a pumice stone following a bath or shower. The less skin on her hands, the less skin to get pinched against the bar, the smaller the rips.

Lotion can be used to keep her hands soft during the day, so when she is on bars, she will have more "mini-rips" and less large ones.

Unfortunately, rips are inevitable...except for a small percentage of kids...and no on knows why.

[bogwoppit]

My dd's hands are always sore. She hates grips. She uses a pumice in the bath and sleeps with Handybalm and socks on her hands when they are very sore. She really only gets rips when she has just gone back to gym after a break, gradually it gets easier. She often puts ice on her hands between bar sets.

Her coach would like her to wear grips, so she can spend more time on the bars, but she hates the "bump" and not being able to feel the bars.

I think they do get used to the constant rubbing to some degree, I also think some girls hold on to the bars very tighly and this causes even more rips.

[gymdog]

I don't know if there's much you can do to prevent them. Once I got through a terrible year of training more swinging in L7 (we went back to bars three times in one practice once), I haven't had a rip in about 5 years. I didn't do gymnastics for the last 4 months or so and I just started swinging giants again about three times a week, and no signs of rips because I hadn't lost the callouses completely yet (although I'm sure if I went back to what I *was* doing it would be pretty bad). Wrists have always been another story, same for most of the people I trained with past L8. A long time on bars and the rips were on the wrist area (where grips rub) and not the hand skin. My wrists never toughened up.

[AnitaV]

I think I had posted this some time back, but panty hose cut and knotted, then wrapped around the wrist and then crossed over to go around two fingers forms a cushion on the palm. This cured my dtr's rips. She almost never gets them. Takes about a week to get used to it on bars as the feel under the grip is different but once you start you never go back. Couple of other girl(s) in the gym do this too.

[ot/fcgymnast]

um when i always come back i get rips but i just tap it, use handy balm, and ice them. i get huge ones but there really isnt anything u can do about it. they say teabags work. i havent really tried them.

[gracefulone]

Quote:
Originally Posted by ot/fcgymnast um when i always come back i get rips but i just tap it, use handy balm, and ice them. i get huge ones but there really isnt anything u can do about it. they say teabags work. i havent really tried them.

Yes, teabags work really well if you need your rip to heal fast for a meet or something, but they tend to temporarily die your rip and the skin around it brown.

[momofagymmie]

My d just showed me her hands this morning. They don't have rips but are red and sore. So i went on this board to see if anyone had advice. THanks so much. we will try a few of the tips written above.

[ihraxhunnie]

Quote:
Originally Posted by AnitaV I think I had posted this some time back, but panty hose cut and knotted, then wrapped around the wrist and then crossed over to go around two fingers forms a cushion on the palm. This cured my dtr's rips. She almost never gets them. Takes about a week to get used to it on bars as the feel under the grip is different but once you start you never go back. Couple of other girl(s) in the gym do this too.

this sounds like a great idea but i can't quite picture how this works.. maybe i'm just dumb lol. could you possibly post a picture of what it should look like? i don't ever rip but i know some girls at my gym that would totally appreciate the advice.