WAG Meets - the good, bad and ugly

[raenndrops]

My biggest beef is someone needs to make a unilateral decision to call the kids names out for awards as "First Name, Last INITIAL, Gym name". I can't tell you how many times an announcer stumbled through awards (usually some poor parent roped into it) in the last two years. One gym did the First Name, Last Initial, Gym name and it went SO much smoother. Sure there are hard to pronounce first names, but they are much fewer and further between than last names that are hard to pronounce.

Some meets we get t's, a few (VERY FEW) we get leos. Generally it's a tshirt coupon for the basic meet tshirt if it's anything. By far though, my second biggest issue is seating. If your gym doesn't have safe seating for the amount of parents the size of the session will bring in (and aunts/uncles/brothers/sisters/etc...) then find an alternate venue or join with a larger gym to host the meet there.

First name, last initial, team is great ... as long as their aren't 3 "Ellie B" in one age group at one gym - and only 1 has an easy to pronounce last name .
One of the meets we went to with not enough seating chose to hold smaller sessions. There were approximately 120 girls scheduled for the meet. EASILY a regular venue could do 60ish per session. Knowing they had limited seating, they did sessions of 35-42 ... then had to move back the start of the meet by 4 hours due to weather (announced at 8pm the night before)... and had several scratches, ending up with fewer than 68 girls TOTAL.

 

[wnl256]

We just finished out our season and DD has been to some wonderful meets and some that were not well run.

I am speaking from 6 years of experience attending meets and running the scoring system at local meets (sitting between the meet director and the announcer).

It is not necessary or even beneficial to place out 100%, even at lower levels.

Totally agreed! 50% is the norm. A few meets take AA out to 100%, but even that is excessive. Honestly, what child wants to know she came in last?

I am sure it was a ton of work, but a couple of meets had places and scores on stickers on the back of the awards. Great idea if you can pull it off.

These are not hard to create with ProScore. But, there's a lot of fussing up front to get the print aligned correctly down the entire page of labels. And for handing out awards you need at least one extra adult -- two is preferred -- to get the labels on the back and in the correct order.

You also need medal handlers who can follow directions (which leads to your next comment...)

The little gymmies love to help with awards, but gyms should set age limits.

Yep. Even if the medals don't have labels you need award handlers who can follow directions.

Oh, and at our State meet, the award announcer was calling 1st place first. All the suspense was just gone. Not nearly as good as building to first.

With on-line scoring these days is it really a surprise anymore? I prefer ending with first but I don't see it as big of a deal as it used to be.

At all the Shawn Johnson meets we went to this season, awards were done in a completely different format. Gymnasts were taken behind the podium and their medals were placed on them backstage. Then the announcer would start with first place and each gymnast would come out and stand, and they would all pose for the group shot. Awards went much faster with this format.

Put the gymnast check in outside of the spectator area.

This can be hard to do with some venues. But every meet I've been to the gymnast was free to enter and proceed on to check-in on their own. Ours is old enough now that we don't feel we have to accompany her to help her find check-in. You could also find a teammate's mom and send your gymmie in with her. Or, just make sure you have the cash.

At one meet, DH drove separately. The line for spectator admission was long. They wouldn't let me buy his wristband because he wasn't right there. They had to physically out it on each person. Seriously?

I've never encountered that. I was always able to pay for a wristband without the wrist being present.

Find a venue that has separate rooms if you have multiple sessions. At States the last two years they had 2 sessions of the same compulsory level going on at the same time in a large auditorium.

I hate to say it, but this is pretty standard at large meets. Get used to it. I can see that it would be more confusing when its the same compulsory music in both sessions. That should be avoided by the meet director for just that reason.

We had one meet put in their schedule that they "reserved the right to start 30 minutes early if they were running ahead." First of all, what meet ever runs early? Secondly, that many everyone had to get there early, just in case. Double the people. Parents for the next session trying to find seats while the current session is just starting the 3rd rotation.

I hate to say it again, but this is pretty standard too. Get used to it. We have had sessions run early, due to a large number of scratches or judges being faster than usual, or any number of other reasons. I've never seen one start 30 minutes early however. I think they say that to get more gymnasts there on-time.

When you have teams too big for one rotation, it is nice when they start on the same equipment, just different flights. That way, two kids from the same gym are very unlikely to be competing at the same time. We like to cheer for our whole team and hate it when we can't watch them ask because one is vaulting while another is on bars (our whatever).

From a coaching standpoint I don't think this is feasible. Coaches need to be present during warm-ups as well as competition. While one flight is competing the other is warming up. If you split a gym across two flights, you will have coaches complain.

 

[wnl256]

Our L4 took 2nd place, with a 246.950. It turns out that L3's announced score was 350.800 (For some reason, they were adding ALL of the scores instead of just top 3).

Classic ProScore mistake. Whoever was running the scoring system printed the team report incorrectly. The default for that report in ProScore is to count all scores from a team. So, whoever has the most gymnasts usually wins. You must put a value in that box (i.e.: "3") to get the right information.

 

[Mom2-4]

The range of gym gifts is huge. My DD's favorites are the free tees that you can customize. R5 cup in Cincinnati gave away free hoodies once. Loved that. Invitationals for us usually run around 100.00 so that is pretty nice. The tanks or leos are always great. Chicago is always great for that. New one every year with the date, so kind of a status symbol. For the Gymnast these can be a pretty big highlight. One of the biggest, best known gyms in our area gives away rubber wrist bands and a cheap water bottle. The looks on the faces of the gymnasts is kind of funny though. It's a great meet though but seriously. They do get so excited over cool gifts.

 

[gwenmom]

We've had two Leo's, bars short and a t-shirt, water bottle, fleece blanket (DD favorite and now goes every where gymnastics related with us), headphones, reusable shopping bags (score for me), socks (another favorite), and not sure what else.

I understand your complaints because I've said the same a few times but after three years of meets, I pretty much roll with whatever and bring snacks lol.

 

[raenndrops]

Classic ProScore mistake. Whoever was running the scoring system printed the team report incorrectly. The default for that report in ProScore is to count all scores from a team. So, whoever has the most gymnasts usually wins. You must put a value in that box (i.e.: "3") to get the right information.

They weren't using ProScore, but I knew what the problem was and TRIED to get them to correct it before the "Powers That Be" in the league read them the riot act!

 

[gymdog]

Wnl - great post - although when a gym is split into two flights that is why the meet information sheet will usually have that team bolder and the number of coaches in parentheses, because a coach will have to be with each flight. But big teams expect this. If you have a team of 30, you need to have 3-4 coaches anyway (unless some practice one set of days and some practice the other...did that once...and then instantly regretted it when meet season rolled around. Never again. Obviously we had other staff to go but of course not the same as me being able to be with each kid on all events).

Also, I wanted to mention that finding a venue can be very difficult for gymnastics meets. You need 20' ceilings and no or minimal obstructions (I.e. A lot of poles in the building could be an issue). In order to fit 2-3 sets of equipment plus enough seating you need a lot of square footage. Then you also need parking, and it has to be a reasonable price because margins are pretty tight on gymnastics meets. Price alone will rule out many venues that might otherwise be feasible. Square footage, ceiling height, parking will rule out many more. High school gymnasiums are popular for a reason.

We always have at least one and usually several state meets at a particular venue which also the venue which hosted USAG nationals in our state. This is not a perfect venue (for example allows no outside hospitality or food) but it ticks all the square footage (all one room), ceiling height, parking needs, and even allowed us to keep the equipment set up in there during the week between the state meet and nationals which saved a massive amount of work and trouble. It's also relatively centrally located in our state.

 

[z2akids]

Most if the meets we attend are either held in high schools or convention centers. Both usually have multiple separate spaces (multiple gymnasium) to run multiple sessions at the same time. Every meet we have attended, except States, has been set up this way.

Meets can be very profitable. Our 2 day meet brings in profits of well over $50k. I don't think it is out of line to expect the gym that wins the bid to host States to run it at least as well as our little gym runs ours. And a venue where the kids are not trying to figure out which music is theirs does not seem like too much to ask. If a venue with multiple rooms is expensive or difficult to reserve, they should research and include that in their bid.

We have never attended a USAG meet in the host's facility. They are all in larger venues that support multiple sessions. One poster was mentioning very small sessions. That is not our experience. Most of our meets have multiple sessions at each compulsory level with approximately 96 gymnasts per session. The optional sessions are generally also as large, although they may include more than one level depending on the size of the meet

 

[gymdog]

I truly feel in my state we do not have many affordable venues that would be able to provide multiple separate spaces for a meet, but of course, that is entirely regional. I have traveled to meets all over the country though, and those that had multiple separate spaces are truly in the minority. I can really only think of "old style" capital cup format meets from when I was a kid, with separate warm up gyms, but that is different and mostly a thing of the past for girls gymnastics.

I'm in one of the larger gymnastics states, so I can feel you on big sessions. The convention centers and high schools we use usually only have one big area that can accommodate gymnastics equipment. I have heard of meets usually multiple venues (I believe the Courtney Kupets Pink Invitational did this), but not in my state really. We only have concurrent sessions at Xcel states, because the other levels just have their own weekends or two levels. In order to do all Xcel levels at once we need two gyms. At level 3 states, we wouldn't be able to have two gyms, because only level 3 competes that weekend and the same judges need to judge everyone. We would never have two concurrent sessions of level 3 running because it would invalidate the team awards. So I find that odd, but it's just not really the case or a problem here.

 

[z2akids]

Well, the two separate sessions in compulsories at our State meet is because we have so many kids that they divide them into two completely separate leagues (for want of a better term). One league is for teams with >14 gymnasts and the other us for smaller teams. The team awards are given within those leagues, so there are 2 level 3, 2 level 4, etc. team champions. The small team league takes the top 3 scores for each event while the large team league takes the top 5. Since they don't compete against each other for individual or team awards, they don't need the same set of judges. There are still more than 350 Level 3 gymnasts in each league and similar amounts at level 4. I don't know how they handle excel or optionals - those State meets are on a different weekend and aren't necessarily even hosted by the same gym.

We don't have separate warm up gyms. There us usually two compete sets of equipment (although the warm up floor is often a tumble track with touches on the task floor) One flight warms up on one beam while the other flight competes on the other. Then the judges move to the second beam and that flight then competes in the beam they just warmed up on.

I know that we are fortunate to live in a fairly competitive State with some really amazing teams and lots of competitive gymnastics taking place.

 

[gymdog]

I'm still a little confused. Do you mean separate rooms, or separate sets of equipment ( two of everything except floor would constitute one "set").

As for the different leagues, makes sense, but just not something we do. We have over that number for level 3 and it all happens over three days on one set of equipment. One session starts when the other one ends, coaches basically have to take turns for bathroom/eating during the warm ups, some watch the kids, some break, then switch. Makes me sad because I like to see awards but can only see the last session of each day.

 

[z2akids]

I mean both. Sorry my terminology was confusing. At States, we have two sets in the same large auditorium. I.e., a total of 4 beam, 4 uneven bars, 2 sets of judges, etc. You mentioned a warm up room, and we don't have that. Every other meet we have attended that has had multiple sessions running simultaneously has the sessions in separate rooms. Yet at States, which IMO should be the best run of all the meets had both sessions in the same auditorium. Not a big deal for bars, vault or beam. and, maybe not a huge deal in optionals. However, there were a lot of little 6 and 7 year old compulsory kids out on the floor trying to do their routines while the music basically played in stereo, but sometimes off by a couple of beats and sometimes by several seconds.

Other States may not have good venues, but there are many here as evidenced by the 12 different meets (other than States) my DD had participated in in the last two years. And, gyms in our State host some of the largest meets in the US. Sure 12 different meets means we are still newbies to usag competition, but that is a fair amount of venues with the ability to separate sessions into different rooms. And, there are many, many other meets at other venues here.

Most of my complaints are definitely not things that affect the competition (but are things that I, as a parent volunteer, find important to running a successful meet that will draw returning gyms). But, little girls should not have to decide which version of their floor music to use.

 

[lhmom]

I mean both. Sorry my terminology was confusing. At States, we have two sets in the same large auditorium. I.e., a total of 4 beam, 4 uneven bars, 2 sets of judges, etc. You mentioned a warm up room, and we don't have that. Every other meet we have attended that has had multiple sessions running simultaneously has the sessions in separate rooms. Yet at States, which IMO should be the best run of all the meets had both sessions in the same auditorium. Not a big deal for bars, vault or beam. and, maybe not a huge deal in optionals. However, there were a lot of little 6 and 7 year old compulsory kids out on the floor trying to do their routines while the music basically played in stereo, but sometimes off by a couple of beats and sometimes by several seconds.

Other States may not have good venues, but there are many here as evidenced by the 12 different meets (other than States) my DD had participated in in the last two years. And, gyms in our State host some of the largest meets in the US. Sure 12 different meets means we are still newbies to usag competition, but that is a fair amount of venues with the ability to separate sessions into different rooms. And, there are many, many other meets at other venues here.

Most of my complaints are definitely not things that affect the competition (but are things that I, as a parent volunteer, find important to running a successful meet that will draw returning gyms). But, little girls should not have to decide which version of their floor music to use.

I was curious as to what part of the country you are in? Almost every meet that DD went to this season had multiple sessions going on in the same area (Ozone, Circle of Stars, Excalibur). These were not small meets either. Ozone had 4 different gyms going on at once, Excalibur 3. Circle of Stars had a bit more separation than the others but we could still hear some of what was going on in the next room. The only one that I can think of off-hand that had a separate warm-up area was Tiger Paw at Clemson.

 

[profmom]

We have been to a lot of meets where they run two sessions in the same space, often at community colleges. It has not been a big deal. Remember that what you hear in the stands is not what the gymnasts hear on the floor. The speakers are oriented toward the competitors, not the audience.

I am still really surprised that coaches would decide not to return to meets because parents were unhappy with things like concessions, gifts, and the setup of audience/gymnast admission. I think at most gyms, coaches make these decisions based on how the meet is run from a coach/athlete perspective. Some of the things like how flights are organized may be less than optimal for spectators, but work better for the coaches and athletes.

With a L8 daughter and a L6 son, my perspective on awards is the quicker the better as long as accuracy is not sacrificed. And that is all. In that regard, sometimes the boys' meets are better, because they will occasionally do things like "OK, you're already up there, #2 switch places with #3, here are your medals, gymnasts salute and get off so we can move on to the next age group!"

 

[lhmom]

With a L8 daughter and a L6 son, my perspective on awards is the quicker the better as long as accuracy is not sacrificed. And that is all. In that regard, sometimes the boys' meets are better, because they will occasionally do things like "OK, you're already up there, #2 switch places with #3, here are your medals, gymnasts salute and get off so we can move on to the next age group!"

^^^^^^^
This!!! That has been one of the nicer perks of DD being in optionals- the awards usually go much quicker because of fewer girls. When she was a compulsory, I swear that some of the award ceremonies seemed to last almost as long as the competition, LOL!

 

[Seeker]

Every other meet we have attended that has had multiple sessions running simultaneously has the sessions in separate rooms.

My daughter is in her 2nd year of Optionals and we have never attended a meet that had different sessions in different rooms. I think that I prefer the large room with multiple sessions so I can watch other teams though. I enjoy that part of meets...seeing different leos, diff levels, etc.

 

[z2akids]

Certainly many of my issues relate to compulsory levels. I don't think optional generally place all the way out, the music is different, there are generally fewer competitors, so fewer sessions, etc.

We have been to Circle of Stars and each session was in a separate room. I don't recall hearing other sessions while in my daughter's competition area. Again, we don't have separate warm up areas. You warm up on the exact piece of equipment you compete on.

Our gymnasts complained at States both this year and last year that they could not always tell which music was theirs. Certainly at the optional level the likelihood that another gymnast is using the same music at the same time is unlikely and, as I said, wouldn't be a problem any more than loud spectators would be a problem.

We are in Ohio.

I never said that our HC would choose not to return based only on parent complaints of awards or concessions. But, our HC is very approachable and in a State with multiple meets most weekends during competition season, there are lots of choices and HC certainly keeps in mind lots of factors when choosing meets, including whether the gymnasts and their pocketbooks (I mean parents) liked it. This year we did not return to the meet where the awards took over 2 hours fern the end of the session. Was that the only reason? Probably not, but I guarantee that our HC knew and would have had that in mind when making meet decisions. And ultimately, that is bad for the host gym/boosters. Meets that generate $10s of thousands are a big business. Regardless of whether the fundraiser is a meet, an auction, a dinner, etc., run it poorly and people will choose to spend their $$ elsewhere. When it is 10:30 at night and overtired 6 year olds (not my kid) are crying on the awards stage because the little award helpers didn't know how to pass out awards and didn't give them their medals, you can be sure that experience will remain in those parents minds. Not a way to sell your meet for the following year.

At least one of the issues in my OP actually happened at our most recent meet and are things that I would change next year to make the experience better for the gymmies and their families.

 

[Deleted member 18037]

3 years of meets. I have gotten used to a certain amount of chaos surrounding meets.

We have pretty much resigned ourselves to having to keep a whole weekend open until last minute because report times take a bit. We pretty much assume we are there for at least 5 hours (so as not to be disappointed). If we are out in 4 we are happy, in less then 4 we are thrilled.

Seating usually sucks, but most folks are reasonable about moving for the parents whose kids are actually up competing at whatever spot they are at. Our venues are mostly at the gyms, so seating is always at a premium and interesting to say the least.

There have been 2 meets that we will never go again.

The first was where they changed the whole weekend. Again I have gotten used to last minute report times, but sorry weekend swap. This was a major complication to our family. Our gym has pretty much decided not do a meet there again, but even if they do, H@ll will freeze over before my money goes there again.

The second, was a gym decision. We had a meet at a gym, and lo and behold, the gym decided during the meet to not do team awards, that were paid for. It seems this was the first time at this yearly meet, the host gym didn't place first (our gym did ). So no they don't get our money either.

 

[Momof2]

I don't mind sitting through awards even though it can be very long because these kids work so hard and I feel like it's there moment. They only do 50% for medals but everyone gets an AA medal. The one thing that does annoy me about the awards is when they don't have enough seats for everyone to sit which is usually always. I've been to one where the parents couldn't even fit in the room and had to stand outside and not even see it.

My kids have never gotten a Leo at a meet so I think that is pretty cool that some of you get that as a gift. We only have 100 string bags and lunch bags.

 

[twinmomma]

While I know it isn't always possible, it would be nice for meet directors to take into consideration how far a team may be traveling from in order to attend a meet. For example, our first meet of the season was 2 hours away, and our girls were scheduled for Sunday evening session at 6pm. It was NOT the only L3 session. They had them all day long. On a Saturday, no problem - I'll book a hotel. Sucks for the pocketbook, but it's worth it. But on a SUNDAY night? First of all, if you have so many kids you need a Sunday 6pm session and it's not a State or Regional meet, you should have cut off your entries. Secondly, L3 girls are usually the youngest of the bunch. So I had an 8 year old in her first two or three weeks of school, not getting home until midnight once we went through awards, fed her, etc... and got home. At least if you're going to have a late session, fill it with local teams (there were plenty to choose from).