Parents So, our gym doesn't have a pit...

[iwannacoach]

i remember those days well...when i could spot on a platform and jump down to follow the athlete. no more, baby.

Hey dunno, I think I got you beat on that one. I can still follow them down from the platform......it's just, um...er...I can't get up!!!

 

[Natalia]

1 1/2 years ago. Marseille Cup. your gym was beautiful and those airpits were amazing. Alsace was beautiful also.

oh yeah...the quiche Lorraine was also very tasty. believe it or not, i had never eaten a quiche until that day.

Glad you liked it over here.Next time you and your family want to come to our little corner of the planet,we would be thrilled to have you as guests.

 

[GymMom22107]

approx $80 a square foot to excavate, construct and pour back walls. what on earth do you think an olympic size pool costs? 10 grand?? geesh. do the math on the number i gave you and that will give you the square footage with a 6 foot depth. i've told you all before...you have no idea how expensive a good training facility can cost. and i said i have both mens and womens. i said i have 12 apparatus that go in to this pit simultaneously without anyone hitting each other. do you understand how big the pit has to be to accommodate that? watch this video and educate yourselves. i would post my own but that would give me away.

International Gymnastics Camp : Summer Gymnastics Camp Training in Pennsylvania

Wow, that is a huge pit! Our gym has 3 pits but they aren't even close to being that big! That is really neat though!

 

[Deleted member D3987]

Glad you liked it over here.Next time you and your family want to come to our little corner of the planet,we would be thrilled to have you as guests.

i will absolutely keep that in mind for the next time. thank you!

 

[littlegirlsdream]

Just curious. is it normal or ok to have a 3 foot drop from where the pit starts to where the loose foam is? There is that blue course carpet looking material with about 1 inch of foam under it on 3 of the pit walls but the pit wall where the tramps are have no cover and about 3 feet on all sides are exposed. Seems odd to me but I know very little.

 

[Deleted member D3987]

it's okay as long as it is tramp bottomed. but they do need to be fluffed up every so often.

 

[AmandaLynn]

Just curious. is it normal or ok to have a 3 foot drop from where the pit starts to where the loose foam is? There is that blue course carpet looking material with about 1 inch of foam under it on 3 of the pit walls but the pit wall where the tramps are have no cover and about 3 feet on all sides are exposed. Seems odd to me but I know very little.

So, basically, one wall has exposed concrete?? If that's what you are saying, then no, I don't think that's okay.

 

[Deleted member D3987]

it's okay as long as it is tramp bottomed. but they do need to be fluffed up every so often.

Amanda is right. i didn't understand that. are you saying that there is exposed concrete?

 

[Canadian_gym_mom]

yes, nicki. That was a canadian invention back in the early 80's. For awhile, there were gyms here that used the cargo/rope netting at the bottom of their pits. There were problems with those and the tramps eventually evolved from that canadian invention. The first pits were in russia and were earthen bottom. Scrap foam was thrown in the hole. Just thought you might want to know who was responsible for the original pits.

ca-na-da! Ca-na-da!

 

[Canadian_gym_mom]

Oh and now I have a question. You mean there is a trampoline under the foam blocks at the bottom of the pit? Does there HAVE to be something at the bottom of the pit?

 

[AmandaLynn]

Oh and now I have a question. You mean there is a trampoline under the foam blocks at the bottom of the pit? Does there HAVE to be something at the bottom of the pit?

In my opinion, Absolutely. There was a coach in NJ a few years back that died of head injuries from an accident while he was tumbling into a pit that did not have a trampoline bottom. I believe that he was playing around (while he was off) and landed head first. I'm sure you could find news articles if you google.

 

[wallinbl]

Oh and now I have a question. You mean there is a trampoline under the foam blocks at the bottom of the pit? Does there HAVE to be something at the bottom of the pit?

Jump into one feet first with a straight body - you'll find that it's rather easy to hit the tramp at the bottom.

 

[Deleted member D3987]

In my opinion, Absolutely. There was a coach in NJ a few years back that died of head injuries from an accident while he was tumbling into a pit that did not have a trampoline bottom. I believe that he was playing around (while he was off) and landed head first. I'm sure you could find news articles if you google.

not exactly. he was doing a triple front for the first time off a mini tramp. they reasoned that they had to stack the foam up so many feet in order to reduce forces at 12ft, 10ft, etc; in the event that he screwed up. one of the master minds was an MIT grad. they just forgot that when you put a vertical wall of anything in front of a gymnast, off any device and doing any kind of front work, the brain/vestibular system "sees" only up. so they pitch forward to make certain that they rotate (the coaches here will understand this). this young man/coach overshot the foam stack clear to the other side and went to his head on the cement bottom. this was due to the fact that they had, and quite literally, used all the foam in the pit to make the mountain. you won't find that in the news articles.

 

[Deleted member D3987]

Jump into one feet first with a straight body - you'll find that it's rather easy to hit the tramp at the bottom.

and so everyone understands, bottom does not mean the cement. these tramp beds will be the 'bottom' but will be up from the cement floor anywhere from 18 inches to 3 feet depending on what that area is being used for.

 

[AmandaLynn]

Ugh. that's awful. I'm pretty sure that when I read about it way back, it was painted as some freak incident. On one hand, I'm glad to know that it was because of a poor decision to move the pit foam. But on the other, that kind of makes it even more heartbreaking, as it was preventable.

However, I will stand by my original statement that tramp bottomed pits are preferable to pits without tramp bottoms 100% of the time.

 

[Pineapple_Lump]

Ughhh, dunno I have a yikes for you. My friend was asking what sort of pits we have, as her club was in the process of getting a new gym. I said tramp or net, she said they can't afford that (should have planned and got more grants). They have filled the bottom with pallets and I believe covered them with mats. I just don't see the point in that at all, I guess it saves them on foam but essentially they have just made a concrete hollow less deep. I did her strongly warn her to convince the club away from this idea and to do it properly
Thankfully the coaching and organisation at the club means they won't really have any mid/high level gymnasts any time soon, so most are limited by their ability from doing anything 'big' into the foam.

 

[Deleted member D3987]

Ugh. that's awful. I'm pretty sure that when I read about it way back, it was painted as some freak incident. On one hand, I'm glad to know that it was because of a poor decision to move the pit foam. But on the other, that kind of makes it even more heartbreaking, as it was preventable.

However, I will stand by my original statement that tramp bottomed pits are preferable to pits without tramp bottoms 100% of the time.

and YOU are 100% correct!

 

[Deleted member D3987]

Ughhh, dunno I have a yikes for you. My friend was asking what sort of pits we have, as her club was in the process of getting a new gym. I said tramp or net, she said they can't afford that (should have planned and got more grants). They have filled the bottom with pallets and I believe covered them with mats. I just don't see the point in that at all, I guess it saves them on foam but essentially they have just made a concrete hollow less deep. I did her strongly warn her to convince the club away from this idea and to do it properly
Thankfully the coaching and organisation at the club means they won't really have any mid/high level gymnasts any time soon, so most are limited by their ability from doing anything 'big' into the foam.

yes, that would be an inferior pit. the legal profession calls that "woefully inadequate". tell your friend that they must make certain that they fluff the area that they keep landing in every 6-8 turns.

 

[gymgal]

do insurance companies have minimum standards for pits before they will insure a gym? The one Pineapple describes sounds like a disaster waiting to happen.

 

[Pineapple_Lump]

yes, that would be an inferior pit. the legal profession calls that "woefully inadequate". tell your friend that they must make certain that they fluff the area that they keep landing in every 6-8 turns.

Lucky for them that they are in a country where no one is sued over accidents (aside from punitive damages).