Is there hope for an ugly BHS?

[UnoMas]

Hi wise coaches,

I am hoping you can shed some light on an issue that my older DD continues to have.

She is 9 y.o. and training L5. She has been able to "do" a RO BHS without a spot for about a year and a half. It has never, ever looked pretty (her legs are apart and sometimes bent, the "apart" factor is what seems to be standing out now that she is doing RO 2BHS for L5.) Last year in L4, she practically fell on her head on the skill 2 times at competitions...but then other times her scores on floor were in the 9-9.2 range (with the rest of the routine looking beautiful with a semi-okay RO BHS).

There are times when it looks better than others but it never looks great. A lot of times, it kind of looks like she is doing it in slow motion!

My question is...is there any hope that she will clean up this skill and get better at it? Or is it one of those things that some kids never get? She's a good gymnast...she scored 36's last year in L4 and after 3 months training L5 she's got all her skills, pretty kips, nice CW on beam, etc. The BHS is just so...not pretty. It's not fear, she's not scared of it...it's just not easy for her even after a year and a half.

Thanks for your thoughts.

 

[gymnastica96]

Ok what I do is first start at the cheese mat and she should focuse on squeezing more at her legs and her butt (I kno it sounds grosse, but trust me it helps). Once she masters it on the cheese, try on the floor or on a mat doing the same thing, focusing on squeezing. Hope this helped...if it makes sense!

 

[ameragym]

A good place to develop the habit of pressing the legs together after the feet leave the floor is by jumping on a trampoline. In a short period of time a gymnast can do between 50 and 100 jumps.

After that, the habit can be borrowed to use on other skills.

Another useful drill is placing a piece of foam between the ankles or knees on standing back handsprings. The foam will relentlessly fly into the air with the slightest lapse of technique.

Another aspect to consider is speed. If the back handspring is slow or its rhythm is uneven by a lag on the hands then this is conducive to flaws. For example, a lag on the hands may occur caused by sagging the back when the hands land on the floor. Even more, the head may be moving out from between the arms.

Take any sag out. Block the floor so as to shift the head between the arms. Look under. Push away. Do not stay on the hands longer than a microsecond. Speed up the entire skill to where she can do two in the time she used to do one.

There's more to this and speed alone does not insure good form. But slow back handsprings can exaggerate poor technique. The head should follow the arms and the arms should lead. The head should not be moving back before the arms.

 

[CreateMagic]

It will get better. As a level 4, there's only one bhs...and its the big skill. Now that she's in level 5 and as she moves toward level 6, that first bhs in the series becomes more about finding more power and position for the second bhs or the tuck. Its going to start having a different feel for her, and she's going to need to make corrections in order for the more difficult tumbling to come...which will become easier as she becomes more aware of what each part of her body is doing and has to do to get that power and body position.

Watching the states video, it looks like she needs to be a little more aggressive in her round-off, push hard through her toes, and snap her feet down quicker and more underneath her to finish with her body moving more backward and not forward. She does have a very pretty routine overall!

 

[mariposa]

I am not a coach, but my DD struggles with this sometimes, not bent legs, but not keeping them together. What seems to have worked with her was drills like the above, maybe holding a small stuffed animal between her knees, really focusing on keeping her legs together. Her coach also focuses a lot on the round off, if legs aren't together when they land the round off, they won't be together in the BHS, says my DD. And her coach means what she says. There are days that my DD won't get past ROs the whole rotation, because she isn't doing them right. And she doesn't move on to 2 BHSs until the ROBHS looks good, etc.

Good luck to her!

 

[gymdog]

I think she will probably get better at it. If she just learned it a year ago, then she is still in the perfecting stage of the skill. Some get it faster than others. When I was a kid we did many sets of BHS in row (from standing) on tumble track. But we don't have a track in the gym I coach at, and I find it takes a little longer. Being able to do the series of BHS on an easy surface is really helpful. If she does this in her practice, then she should focus hard there so the rhythm carries over to floor.