WAG Punishment for doing bad at meets?

[Gymnast123]

How do your (or your DD's) coaches handle the team doing badly at a meet? Do they just brush it off or get mad? My team didn't do very well at a meet recently and my coach made us condition nonstop for the entire three hour practice as punishment. The last practice before another big meet, may I add. I'm just wondering if this is normal with other gyms.

 

[gymnastbeth]

That's not normal, at least not at my gym. Conditioning punishment (especially before another meet) won't help a gymnast perform better at a meet. When I have a bad meet, my coaches have me do a certain number of all the skills that went wrong in some way. It's reasonable, and helps me gain confidence on the skills I was shaky on.

 

[Quadqueen]

no, that's not normal at DD's gym. They might get a talk/lecture from head coach/owner, who likes to "talk," but that's it. And no conditioning the week of a meet, usually.

 

[sglemon]

The girls usually get a talk. Actually it doesn't matter how they did, there is always a "talk". The Monday after a meet is "Funday Monday" where they spend most of the practice doing fun stuff, instead of a normal practice. It can be taken away, if the coaches aren't happy with how the girls did. I mean, "how they did" applying corrections and such, not scoring, or behaving improperly. So I guess a normal practice is "punishment". LOL

 

[cbifoja]

Bella had never indicated they get punished for poor meet placement. That didn't seem consistent with our coach's approach to training.

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[CoachGoofy]

No no no no.

In fact, we just had our big beginning of the season talk about how this is fun, the future of the human race does not rest on whether or not you hit your routines, everyone is so proud of you if you go & try your hardest, no one is going to be upset or punish you if you have a bad day (I mostly coach low/mid level T&T, they're new to competition).

As long as they go out there & try to do their best, whatever their best is that day, & handle success OR failure with good sportspersonship, they are so not in trouble. I've been prouder of kids who had really bad meets athletically speaking but good attitudes than of ones who hit phenomenal routines & then went all McKayla Maroney on me during awards.

That's not normal by my definition, at least.

 

[Deleted member D3987]

Yikes!!!!!!

 

[GymBee97]

No not normal at all. usually my DD's coach just reviews the meet and scores when he hands out the score cards and asks the girls if they know why they got a low score (sort of judging themselves) you know forgot to point toes, fell on behind on big move and so on. then the girls make goals for what they want to improve on and then on to practice with a positive attitude and a plan to improve. So long as the team looks like they were trying the coach is ok with low scores you can't ask for more than a good effort.

You get one judge in a bad mood or a really tough judge and scores will be low.

 

[Kiwi]

It doesn't sound healthy.

 

[marie83]

No we never use conditioning as punishment for any reason.
We never punish gymnasts for doing badly in competition.
If they do their best on the day and it goes wrong they are going to feel bad enough. Of they don't do their best, competitive gymnastics is probably not for them! As coaches we try to make all their gym experiences as positive as possible.
Of course there are times when we get cross or frustrated but in general it's positive!

 

[krisnkids]

Punishment for our girls is to have to repeat the skills that they messed up on over and over with the coach nitpicking everything they messed up on. Before they do this they get their normal warm up which includes conditioning, with the coach nitpicking at how to do the warm up. So I don't consider it a punishment but reinforcing what they should be doing and what they are doing wrong.

 

[Canadian_gym_mom]

I would not have my daughter at a gym that punished for poor placement. If my dd was a poor sport, goofed around, broke the rules or some other thing like that at a meet, I would expect swift and harsh discipline by the coaches.

Placement, poor perceived effort or obvious disappointment after a not so great routine are reasons for encouragement and support, not punishment.

 

[catou]

Wow! First, a poor performance can happen to anyone. And should never, never be the case for punishment. This is just a way to increase pressure for the next meets. Which in itself, won't help the performance.

Conditioning should not be used as a punishment. It's a very important part of gymnastics. It is very useful to prevent injuries and help to learn new skills. It should be perceived like that by the gymnasts. And it certainly should not be done during 3 hours right before a meet. What a good way to be sore and have muscle fatigue... and a an even poorer performance.

That said, I hope you'll have better meet next time

 

[gymmomtoo]

THere's a talk/lecture but no conditioning for punishment--usually lots of requirements for skills that were missed (i.e. stick 10 routines rather than normal 5 or whatever).

 

[JBS]

When our gymnasts do poorly at a meet...I stand in the corner and give myself a "time-out".

 

[LizzieLac]

Nope. Conditioning is a means to become a better athlete/gymnast. That being said, if the girls goof off during practice, don't focus, or get lazy during their workout, they might find their conditioning to be "a little harder" that day.

 

[coachmolly]

I guess it depends on what led to the meet being so bad. If it was a kid that had been skipping practices, goofing off when at the gym, not following directions, or not taking corrections, I might "lay down the law" a little bit by giving a talk on how you train is how you compete and the like. But I feel like that's a rarity. Usually it's just the case of a bad day, a bad case of nerves, or something else that is somewhat uncontrollable and uncharacteristic. If that's the case, just a reminder that a bad day doesn't make them a bad gymnast or define them as a person and lots of work on the missed skills and routines with an audience if nerves were an issue.
Spending a day doing intense conditioning or pounding down their sense of self worth isn't likely to help the next time around.

 

[Deleted member D3987]

When our gymnasts do poorly at a meet...I stand in the corner and give myself a "time-out".

bwhahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

 

[Gymmommy71]

Our girls will get a stern talking to if the coach doesn't feel they did as well as they could have. From what DD has told me, it is never directed at an individual girl (or girls) and is never demeaning. I don't think I've ever really seen a gymnast that I've known from any of my DD's teams NOT take a meet seriously (maybe this does happen w/ some gymnasts, but I've never seen it), so I'd hate to see girls punished when they were trying their best to do well. Either way, my daughter wouldn't last too long at a gym that punished the team w/ physical exercize because she and/or her teammates made an uncharacteristic mistake at a meet...or even a characteristic one. When I say she wouldn't last, that's because (1) she would hate it and want to leave, and (2) I'd agree w/ her and move her .

 

[kayjaybe]

No - our gym doesn't do that.

The only thing that our girls have ever "gotten in trouble for" after a meet is if there was a behavior problem. At a recent meet we hosted, some girls were fooling around in the pit and on the trampoline. Both the parents AND the gymnasts heard about that one, as we should.

ETA: the girls fooling around weren't competing that session. They were there because the parents were working the meet or they just wanted to hang out and watch.