Parents Your gyms requirement for level 4

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momof5

Proud Parent
I got to thinking after I read another post that every gym seems to have different ways of picking kids for the team and different philosophys for what skills they need to be able to do to be moved to team. My dd gym has a week long tryout camp that they use to pick the team and preteam. I know that last year the girls picked for team were unable to do shoot thrus, mill circles and front hip circles. Not one had their backhandspring and no one had their beam dismount. I guess they figure that they will be able to do them by the time they start competeing in Jan. This year one of the coaches said that the requirements were going to be a little tougher but she wouldn't say specifically. I was wondering how your gyms move kids to team and what skills they need to have?
 
I am not sure exactly what they look for at DDs gym. Of the new level 4s, a few came from pre-team or training team and 5 (including my DD) came from a 2x a week developmental class. None of them have their mill circle or front hip, but several are pretty close. They all had their BHS with a spot, some without, some had their ROBHS with spot. I know that all of our girls moved at once, which was good as they are all the youngest and it helps that they can stick together.

It is interesting how all gyms are different. I know DDs old gym had harder requirements. I don't think my DD would be on team had we stayed at her old gym, she might have never been "team material" at that gym.
 
I know 75% of our team girls come from developmental programs and pre-team. Maybe 25% will come from classes. Right now on our pre-team of the 14 girls 10 have their shoot through, 10 have their RBHS, 0 have their front hip circle, and 1 has their mill circle. Mind you this is a group of girls aged 4-12. They have not officially announced who is moving to team yet but I am sure the announcement will be soon. We don't make changes till June.
 
Well things are a little different in Australia because competitive gymnastics can start from level 1, so most gyms offer competition teams right from this stage. But we look for kids who seem to have a real love for the sport and are prepared to make the committment. It comes as much from the childs (and parents) desires as it does from their ability. Some kids just want to be recreational and have fun learning skills coming once or twice and week. And others would be in the gym every minute of the day if we let them.
 
Our gym starts competing at L2 but advancement to all the levels is about the same. In May, the coach places the girls on whatever level she expects they will compete in the next season. She looks for average scores of 36 at the meets and the average of their two best AA scores (among other things, I'm sure) to help determine if they get to move up. In my DD's case (and a couple of others), she already had all of her L3 skills and her "best average" L2 score was over 37.5, which was high enough to let her skip L3 and go into training L4. Then they have until the end of July to get all their L4 skills without spots. If they don't, they can't compete that level in January and will get moved back a level. However, the coach is very careful to only move girls up in May whom she is confident will be able to get the skills. It is not her goal to have to move girls back.

I'm not entirely sure how the move from pre-team to Level 2 is determined. I do know that pre-team trains the L2 skills so they probably get to move up if they have them all and are ready to learn the routines, although I'm sure the coach has other things she looks for (maturity, willingness to listen and work, etc). Anyway, I hope some of this helps.
 
It is hard to say. When my dd started level 2 was the intermediate class, level 3 was pre-team and then they started competing at level 4. In order to move to level 4 they had to have all their skills consistently by themselves. In the gym she is at now they just started competing level 3 and the girls are selected by the coaches based on work ethic, strength, flexibility and skills. From there they move up levels based on scores and the coaches discretion.
 
Our gym moves girls to team from preteam. I am not sure how the coaches determine who moves up. I know that most of the girls don't have all the skills before they move up, but our competition season doesn't start until December so they have a long time to get the skills. We have yet to have any girls not get all skills by the first meet. We don't have L2 or L3 so the route is developmental, then preteam, then Level 4. My dd had her front hip, shoot through and mill circle (some of the time), and her vault, but not her beam dismount or ro/bhs (did have standing bhs) before she was moved up last May, but many girls did not have the front hip yet. Moving up after Level 4 is decided at the end of the summer when the coaches assess how the next Level skills are coming along.

Meg
 
Our gym moves them up around the end of summer and occasionally adds a girl or 2 during the season if they are ready. Coach doesnt even want any of the girls thinking bout levels til she decides at the end of summer. As for the level 4s most of them dont have all their skills but get them as the season progesses.
 
All the level 4 girls on dd team came up from the developmental team. Most of them moved up every year from Mighty K's, to Invitation Only up to Developmental. Then, last spring, they all got an invitation to be on the team. Also, before they can compete level 4 they must be 6 years old. My dd just made the cut off, turning 6 in August. I'm still waiting to see how they do it for Level 5. With level 5 comes the contract to sign, the fund raising, the volunteering, etc. So, it should be interesting.

As far as the skills go, a lot of posters here know that my dd did not have her ROBHS until a few weeks ago. Weeks after states. If they wouldn't let her compete without the skills needed on every event, she only would've been able to compete beam and vault. Her front hip circle on the bars finally came toward the end of the season but the ROBHS never came. She does it now, and is working on doing the 2 BHS needed for the level 5 routine. So, she is progressing!
 
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My daughter moved up from preteam to Level 4 with 6 other girls. Preteam was invitational only based the owners opinion. None of the girls had level 4 skills prior to getting on the team. They only competed vault for the first couple of meets, eventually they got all of the skills and competed all around. As you know from my previous posts this was very stressful and I almost wished she had another year to prepare. I think the coaches philosphy was at least they are competing and if they want to do all the events seeing other girls do them will push them to make them try harder. I am not sure if this was good or bad but my daughter has really come along way in the past year.:eek:
 
Most of our team comes from the pre-team. The pre-team draws from the recreation program once a year. The girls that the competitive coaches are interested are invited to a tryout. The girls are then tested for basic skills, flexibility, strength, and coachability. A few girls are brought onto the preteam. When my daughter was brought on there were 20 girls at the tryout and 6 girls were invited onto the preteam. The girls usually sit on preteam for a year and then are tested for the level 4 team. To get onto team a girl has to have all her level 4 skills “competition ready”; which means she has to be able to show that skill on demand and the skill has good form.
The preteam route is for the girls under 11. The team also has some older girls. These girls must have all their level 4 skills consistently to be invited onto team on tryout status. They are given the summer to clean up their skills.
 
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My DD was in the right place at the right time for our L4 team. Our current gym owners took over the gym about 5-6 years ago and went thru a transition period where they lost girls and coaches. They ended up with a small group of L4 girls that did not compete the year before last, no L5's and no L6's. They did have 7,8's, 9's and 10's. My DD was invited onto a pre-team program 2 yrs ago and then invited onto the L4 team at age 6 last year. I am thinking they decided to do what they could with the amount of girls they had in pre-team and added them to the older ones already in L4. They brought on a good coach to help jump start the program again at the L4 foundation. They added another 2 coaches (one is a judge!) and first yr out send all 16 girls to states and our team came in 9th out of about 30+ gyms! 1/2 the group moved to L5 and our younger group (the 6's and a couple young 7's) will do another yr of L4. I feel like my DD was very lucky to be in the right place at the right time while the gym was re-building the lower level teams.

However, when she came to L4 she had no skills for the routines other than the vault and a pullover on bars. She had to learn everything within 3 months of her first competition. Pre-team had built up her strength and she was in the gym 4 hrs/week though and that did help her acquire the skills pretty quickly. Now the gym learned from last year and they are starting the girls earlier w/routines and making sure pre-teamers have more L4 skills. They work out more hours now (7)and spend one night w/L4's too which is a plus. My DD had to transition from 4 to 10.5 hrs, there was no in between like they have now. Thye also have a advanced pre-school class which will feed into the pre-team program I believe. The futire team will be so much more ready than my DD ever was!

Our team also has some girls that came over for some other gyms and also we have a girl that came from our JOGA program becasue she wanted to do USAG instead. She had skills, just needed to refine them some.

I am jealous of all of you who go to gyms that have these lower levels in place like L2 and L3. It gives the girls a better foundation for L4 team and the opportunity to experience meets too. I often feel my DD was rushed into it & didn't get to really have fun the first year. Now that she is repeating, I think she will enjoy it more and feel confident.
 
When my DD was first evaluated at our current gym last summer, there was discussion about putting her on L3. She was already doing a L2 rec program at another gym. She was only 5, though, and didn't have many of the skills. The coach said she could do L3 but probably would struggle, or she could have a very successful L2 season. We decided to do L2 and it has turned out great. DD had an awesome season, won two state titles and is now a 6-year-old L4.

Generally, though, our preteam feeds into L2, although there are a couple of older girls who went into L3.
 
Just out of curiosity - if preteam feeds into level 2 - what level is preteam. The only thing under is level 1 which is beginner, never done gymnastics before. All the gyms we have been to have had preteam either as level 3 or 4. Just wondering - I know all gyms do things different - I've just never heard that done before. I know some gyms that do rec competitions - is that kinda what it is?
 
Just out of curiosity - if preteam feeds into level 2 - what level is preteam. The only thing under is level 1 which is beginner, never done gymnastics before. All the gyms we have been to have had preteam either as level 3 or 4. Just wondering - I know all gyms do things different - I've just never heard that done before. I know some gyms that do rec competitions - is that kinda what it is?

Preteam is when they start learning the L2 skills. Once they have most of them, they get moved to L2 team where they'll perfect those skills and learn the routines. Since L2 is the first competitive level, the HC/O wants to give them plenty of time to feel confident and comfortable with the skills and routines.
 
Oh - ok - I was confused - I thought they were doing a level 1 preteam - that is why I was like, huh? Then again it doesn't seem to take much to confuse me these days, lol.
 
Oh - ok - I was confused - I thought they were doing a level 1 preteam - that is why I was like, huh? Then again it doesn't seem to take much to confuse me these days, lol.

I know the feeling. I think I lost half my brain cells with each kid. Since I've got three kids, that means I've only got about...... ah..... no brain cells left. :D
 
Most of the gyms in my area start out competing at level4 or 5 there is no level 2 or 3 competing. Level 4 seems to be the starting point from competing in my area. Many of the girls on the developmental team go right into level 5.
 
It occurs to me that I probably should have clarified. Our gym competes L2-L4 at AAU. They don't start competing USAG until L5.
 
What is AAU- we don't have that by us (not that I know of anyway).
 

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