Adult novice and gym mum

[Kiwi]

Hi, I'm from New Zealand, I'm almost 44 and have two daughters, one is 9 and does recreational gymnastics, the other is 7 and has just done level 1 competitive gym.

I was a recreational gymnast for a few years as a kid, between about 9 and 14. I hadn't done any gym for about 30 years when last year I decided to try the adults class at our gym. I can only do really basic stuff like handstands and cartwheels but even the basic stuff is fun. Unfortunately the class isn't really a class, you just get to use the gym and there is one coach to supervise. He will help you if ask him for specific help with something. The class contains mainly a bunch of young dudes doing stunt kind of stuff. I'm mainly trying to train all by myself which is quite hard. Sometimes there are one or two ex-competitive women who come along and sometimes they help me a bit. This year I competed at the NZ Masters Game in the novice competition. It was great fun and a real buzz to be in a proper gymnastics competition and feel like a real gymnast for a day.

I think gymnastics is a little different in New Zealand from the USA. I think it is not as competitive here. Here the kids compete right from level 1. Our gym has an A stream and B stream for WAG. The A stream train a lot and are headed towards being elite gymnasts competing at international level. The B stream gymnasts tend to be a little older, they don't train as much and mainly compete locally.

My 7 year old daughter is in the B stream and has just finished the competition season for level 1. She finds it quite hard and I know level 2 is going to be tough for her. We practice at home quite a bit. She loves gymnastics and wants to do well so is very motivated.

Next year I hope to go to some of the courses held by NZ Gymsports for beginner coaches and judges.

 

[Megz]

Which gym do you go to? I'm in Auckland too and the young guys doing parkour is exactly what happens when I go to adult gym! In fact, I could have written everything you just wrote due to it applying to me also. Actually, I DID write pretty much exactly the same thing in my intro a few threads down from this one (entitled "I guess I should do an intro for myself")!

You don't happen to go to North Harbour by any chance??

 

[Kiwi]

Hi Megz, great to see another kiwi adult gymnast! I go to Tri-Star, are you at North Harbour? I was wondering about checking out their classes, although it is a bit of a hike across the bridge. I think Waitakere has an adult tumbling class, I was thinking of checking out. Though with a full-time job and two kids it is hard to find time to fit in any kind of training!

I read your intro, you sound awesome, aerobics world champs at 12! I must admit, I wasn't much good at anything, though I didn't train much either. I got my silver badge and was working on gold when I gave up at about 14. I was struggling with the front walkover on floor and the forward roll on beam. I've always had flexibility issues. In hindsight, I wish I'd kept trying and gone for my gold badge, but at the time I was getting no encouragement, the coaching was apathetic and I had no confidence in myself.

I did aerobics classes for fitness for a few years, did a couple of years of tae-kwon-do and a couple of years of adult beginner jazz dance and then became a bit of a couch potato. I guess I never really got gymnastics out of my system. I wish I'd known about adult gymnastics when I was much younger. You sound way more advanced than me! But I'm happy to keep chipping away at my level, hoping to gradually improve and maybe add a few new skills here and there.

 

[Megz]

Ohhh Tri Star! I'm planning on going there too! And perhaps Counties as well. It's so crazy because it sounds exactly like North Harbour the way you described it.... I thought for sure you were this woman I met a couple weeks ago! So Tri Star is full of guys doing stunts too? Hmm... I wish they did proper coaching....

Yeah I go North Harbour at the moment, I must warn you that the gym is VERY cold. Like, you stand still for 2 minutes and your muscles are cold. That's the only annoying thing, other than that it's all good. There's a man who does coaching to some of the older guys (as opposed to those doing random flips off equipment etc) and he is very nice and VERY strong. He's in his 60s maybe and he can do an iron cross on the rings!

Same here about not getting gym out of the system... it's almost annoyingly addictive. I want to compete at masters in Jan 2012, will you be aiming to compete again?? =)

 

[Kiwi]

Absolutely I intend to compete again!

I went to gym tonight and met two other ladies who were also lamenting the lack of coaching. They said they used to go to the Tri-Star adults class about two years ago and there was a woman coach who actually took a proper class, with a group warm-up and then around all the apparatus to work on skills with each person. They were really disappointed that it was now just free time in the gym. We're going to approach the management to see if we can get someone to coach us in a proper class. Between us we also know of at least two other women who might be interested. If you came as well, that would be a class of about six people. I think they would attract even more women in if they did this, as now and then I've seen new people turn up and then not come back again and I'm pretty sure this is the reason why.