5 PHASES Pre-Competitive Phase (3-6 years old) As coaches developing gymnasts in the pre-competitive phase we’re establishing the base of a passionate love and understanding in the sport. If we were to liken this to growing a tree, this phase would deal with first selecting the seeds and then deciding where exactly we’d like to plant them. This phase is so important as its from which everything else must stem. Let’s begin with selection. In order to achieve competitive success we must first ensure that we’re investing our time and skill into the gymnasts with the most talent. If not then we’re not doing our best job as a competitive coach. The quality of gymnastics we produce is a product of both controllable and uncontrollable factors. Talent is one of those uncontrollable things, but how we select it is completely controllable! We just have to make that selection very early on and with a limited amount of information. There are 3 classifications of talent: 1...

This is a very important article to read for anyone who works in the field of human movement. When it comes to developing functional movement, often the very first step and goal is improving the body’s capability for full range movement. Movement happens about the body’s 360 joints and the degree in which they are able to achieve movement is referred to as ‘range of motion’ or ROM. Each joint must fulfill a specific degree of ROM in order to move in a way that maximizes the body’s biomechanical output, conserves energy, minimizes the leaking of forces, and inhibits the tendency for other muscles need to overcompensate. This is known as functional range. Below you can see a nice and simple example of this where a pelvic imbalance can produce compensations further up the chain at the neck. If ROM is limited, two things happen: first of all the movement must go on and so other joints must move more in order for the body to reach its destination. And two, in order for the muscles to ea...