In Malcolm Gladwell’s book, he wrote that it takes 10,000 hours of practice to become an expert in any field, and gymnastics is probably the one sport on earth that is out to prove that theory to be true. 

After coaching for almost two decades, I can honestly say that at least once a week, there is some athlete within my program that wants to quit. The desire to leave the sport is typically preceded by either doing bad in a meet, getting chewed out by a coach, or being told to do burpees until their arms fall off because they failed to follow directions for the umteeth time. There are many reasons why an athlete typically wants to quit a sport, and to be honest, most of them usually amount to bullcrap. Although there are legit reasons, such as education, health, and finances, for not continuing with a sport, quitting just because they are mad, struggling, or frustrated is not one of them and is entirely unacceptable. The reasons an athlete can give for quitting typically fall under a three or four buckets. These buckets in no particular order are laziness, fear of failure, lack of or unrealistic expectations, which is like the second but different, and the lack of discipline. In this blog, I am going to take time and break down the various buckets and how to avoid the “early retirement syndrome” from a sport in the future. This is a scorching hot topic with a lot of pieces, so instead of writing one long-ass blog, I am going to break it up into four or five digestible blogs, with this blog being the first. 

Before we jump into the blog, let me take time for a free plug. Gymnastics season is coming, so if you are looking for some cool, unique gymnastics spirit tees, hoodies, and sweatshirts, head on over to https://gdswagshop.com/ to see what we have to offer. Also, follow us on IG for discounts and early release items @ Gymnastics Dad.   

Parent the #$%# up (Discipline)

News flash, coaches, don’t instill discipline. They just build off the discipline that has already been established in the home. Therefore, if discipline has not been established at home, there is nothing for a coach to build off of. Most good coaches are not passive people. Competition and the desire to win have made them very results-driven, matter-of-fact, direct, and assertive. To the typical person, this can come off as rough around the edges but they are not. If you are a passive parent who tries to avoid conflict with your children, then being coached by a person who values competition and athletic growth may be hard for your child to handle. Good coaches want to win or at the very least see progress, “periodt.” Anything that gets in the way of that is an unneeded distraction. So if a child that has to be coddled or persuaded into performing may not fair well with competitive coaches. Good programs operate like “ole skool” households,  they are dictatorships, not democracies.  

If your child wants to quit because their coach is viewed a mean and/or unapproachable, then parents might have to ask themselves if it is a coaching issue or “me” issue. If your parenting style isn’t conducive to a coach’s training style, then conflict will occur. The child will get mixed messages and process a coach’s reaction to a situation incorrectly. Being pissed at something an athlete did poorly in a competition doesn’t mean a coach dislikes the child as a person. It simply means the coach is irritated with that athlete’s action in that snapshot in time but it has no impact on their future impressions of the child. As a child, I was raised in the era when parents told their kids what to do. My household was a miniature version of North Korea. My mom commonly said things like, “when I want your opinion, I will give it to you” and “speak when spoken to.” What, seriously? We frequently heard things like, ”You eat what I cook, or you don’t eat.” As I got older, I understood what my mom was telling me with those statements.  It was that a child needs to stay in a child’s place. I hadn’t earned the right to have an opinion. I was broke and homeless. My parents might have been middle class, but my broke ass was destitute, and boy did they let me know it. Thanks, mom(sarcasm). I didn’t have any life experiences, and therefore I needed to rely on my parents and my village to make decisions in my best interest, even if I didn’t believe so at the time. I can’t count how many sports, clubs, and organizations I have been in over the years because my mother thought it was good for me. I don’t think I even knew what quitting was, much less I knew quitting wasn’t an option. If I got chewed out at practice and came home mad, my parents would say something to the effect, “your ass better do better next time, so you don’t get cussed out”…really? I don’t think my parents even looked up from what they were doing when they said it. My parents were no joke, and my coaches were no joke, so when my coaches chewed me out for doing something wrong, it was similar to my experiences at home. Due, to the conduciveness in my experiences between home and the teams I was on I never felt put-off by a coach coming down on me.  I wasn’t coddled at practice which was fine because I wasn’t coddled at home either. 

In closing, I can’t understand why parents would allow a child with no resources and no life experiences to potentially make a life-altering decision. When my older children wanted to quit a sport, my answer was simple “that decision is above your pay grade.” I have a simple rule to playing sports, always leave on top. It is easy to quit after a good ass-kicking or after a good chewing out by a coach. Name one athlete that walked away from a sport after a successful season…(I’ll wait).

If an athlete has many of the physical tools necessary to be successful and only requires a little mental grit and elbow grease to take the next step, instead of allowing them to bail on the sport, make them knuckle up and go through it…..nothing comes to a sleeper but a dream and you can’t short cut success.

Part Two is coming in the next seven days. Follow me on IG to get an alert. 

The post My Gymnast Wants To Quit The Sport appeared first on Gymnastics Dad.

Good day readers welcome back to another installment of Gymnastics Dad blog. I haven’t posted in a while because I have been down in the lab developing a new platform called chalkyhandsprofiles.com, where gymnasts can set up and maintain their athletic profiles. I was searching for a profile site to load my daughter’s profile since she is moving to Level 9. After doing some research, I realized that none of the companies I researched offered quite what I was looking for. Having built a similar platform when I was a booster club president, I know the features that are needed to increase the odds of parents CONSISTENTLY updating it. Being a web developer for the last 17 years, I figured, might as well just build what I want and offer it to anyone else who might be interested. If interested in learning more about Chalky Hands profiles, visit www.chalkyhandsprofiles.com.

Before we get started, I want to send a shoutout to Summer Levell for being selected GDN Apparel Student-Athlete for July. Summer is a soon to be  Level 8 gymnast. To learn more about Summer, and to watch some of her Level 7 performances visit HERE. 

In this blog, I am going to talk about the college recruiting process for sports, and assumptions parents make when it comes to the recruiting process. I am also going to talk about how those assumptions can potentially cost an athlete a scholarship. I decided to write this blog because since being in the pre-release phase of Chalky Hand Profiles, I have had a lot of parents pre-register for the platform. One of the most common questions I get is when should a parent set up a profile for their athlete? I think the answer to that question will differ depending on who you talk to. Although I don’t have first-hand knowledge of best practice on when to set up a recruiting profile as this is my first go around. Someone who has been in the recruiting game for a while told me that by Level 9, a gymnast should have a profile.

~By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail. Benjamin Franklin~

Being a track coach, I have had the opportunity to send several athletes to college on a track scholarship. Although I don’t have direct knowledge of what it takes to earn a gymnastics scholarship, what I do know is that gymnastics has a lot in common with track and field, so my guess is many of the principles of recruiting are the same. The two most important things that both track and gymnastics have in common is that they are both individual sports with relatively small budgets. Having a low budget has a pretty significant impact on how much a college can recruit. Of everything I have learned about the recruiting process for track, the biggest thing is that regardless of sport, earning a scholarship always boils down to preparedness and avoiding taking things for granted.

Mistake #1: “If I build it, they will come.”

The first mistake I see parents and athletes make when it comes to recruiting is developing the “Noah’s Ark mentality.” The Noah’s Ark mentality is when parents believe that if an athlete performs well in competitions, then the recruiters will come, and that is so not the case.

In general, every year, there are typically a couple of athletes in a given sport that every college is gunning for. From a recruiting standpoint, there is “dat athlete,” and then there is everyone else. You can usually identify “dat athlete” in a competition because they are the person everybody is “oohing and ahhing” about. If your child is “dat gymnast,” then you are pretty much set. College coaches will damn near sell the farm to recruit your child. Still, if your athlete is not “dat gymnast,” then you best have your ducks in order when it comes to college recruiting. Your gymnast earning a college scholarship will primarily come down to how efficient and organized you are at representing your gymnast and their body of work to a college recruiter. Remember that even if your child is a local superstar or an Instagram sensation, that doesn’t mean that their value is the same on a national level. Colleges are not confined to the local area when it comes to recruiting. Recruitment is typically a national thing and, in some cases, a worldwide thing.

Mistake #2: “My coach should help with the recruiting process.”

The second mistake I see parents make is when they are under the belief that it is part of the coach’s responsibility to help athletes earn a scholarship. Listen, parents, coaches are responsible for dozens of athletes in a given year, and each of those athletes has the same goals and aspirations as your child to earn a college scholarship. A coach’s job is to get your athlete performance-wise in a position to receive a scholarship. Still, much of the leg work in getting on a college coach’s radar is primarily up to you. Understanding a youth coach’s actual role in the recruiting process will help parents get ahead of the game. I have seen too many athletes regardless of sports graduate high school never receiving a scholarship because they were waiting on the coach…. don’t be that person.

Mistake #3: “Things may come to those who wait, but only things left behind by those who hustle.” – Abraham Lincoln (I think….)

Ladies and gentlemen, of all the cardinal sins that happen in sports recruiting this is probably the gravest. I don’t know how many athletes miss out on opportunities because they waited too late to get into the recruiting game or wanted to wait for the college of their choice, and they never came. Guess what people, damn near every gymnast that I know, want to go to UCLA, my child included. Although college recruiters can only reach out to you after a certain time, you can start researching them at any time. Find out who’s on their roster now, who will be on their roster when you apply. Learn what that particular coach is looking for in an athlete. How deep the team is with athletes. Find out the team’s strengths and weaknesses and if your strengths help to fill a gap. All those questions come after you ask the most important two questions, do you want to go to that college(outside of the team) and do they have your field of study.

Mistake #4: You’re resume sucks, that is all!

My first resume sucked! Oh my gosh, it was horrible! I remember having to take a seminar in my senior year in college that taught us how to write resumes. By the end of the workshop, I had an excellent starter resume, or so I thought. You are probably thinking, what does a resume have in relation to getting recruited. Well, online profiles primarily serve as an athlete’s resume and are critical in the recruiting process, especially if done right. At the very least athletic profiles tell a college that you are serious about the recruiting process. Athlete profiles serve as a way to centralize an athlete’s information in one location. When you first build your resume, you put stuff on it that you “think” are vital to potential suitors. Very quickly, you learn that it is not the information they are looking for. The earlier you’re gymnasts start their online profile, the sooner you can learn what information colleges are actually looking for. Athletic profiles, like resumes, are living documents that change over time. The more you feed it information, the faster it can grow, and the better it will be. Free plug, if you are reading this, you really need to sign up for the waiting list on www.chalkyhandsprofiles.com. You won’t regret it. You might actually win a free account. Lastly, no, social media accounts are not substitutes for online profiles. They are fine as “in addition to’s,” but they should not serve as a replacement. There are dozens of technical reasons why using social media as the primary platform for your online profile is a bad idea, but the first non-techie reason is that NOT EVERYONE USES IT. Also, the response of “you can follow me on IG” doesn’t sound like the best response to a recruiter saying “where can I learn more about you from”….just sayin.

The last mistake and I think the most detrimental of all is when parents hoard knowledge. Youth sports, in general, is a vicious environment, but it seems like in gymnastics, it’s kicked up a notch. Some parents think that by attempting to keep knowledge from other athletes that somehow increases the odds of their gymnast getting recruited…yea, no, it doesn’t work like that. Truthfully most of the information that parents have is readily available on the internet if someone looks deep enough. Secondly, by hoarding information you are not preventing anything, you are pretty much just delaying the inevitable, at best. What you are doing is preventing yourself from gaining the knowledge you might have not otherwise known. As a booster club president at our old gym, I set up a conference call for the gym parents with a well-known company that specialized in gymnastics college recruiting. Bringing in a college recruiter wasn’t something I had to do. I could have kept the information to myself or between my level. Still, my thinking was that the long term benefit of having that knowledge in house would create an opportunity for the program to start building pipelines to different colleges. Yes, in youth sports, there is such a thing called pipeline programs. Pipeline programs are programs or coaches that develop a relationship with particular colleges, and kids from that program tend to have a better chance of being selected by that school than other recruits.

In closing, in a post-COVID-19 world, companies across all spectrums are revisiting the way they do business. Efficiency is king now. It is going to be more critical than ever to be as streamlined as possible in the recruiting process. If you have read my previous blogs, then you know that I view gymnastics as an investment, this shit is too expensive to just be for “play play.” For me, I would hate to have invested all this money in gymnastics for my daughter just to fall short at the end because I didn’t have my shit together. When it comes to college recruiting, efficiency is critical…” food for thought, now you do the dishes” – Jay Z.

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I decided to write this blog from a parent standpoint. A couple of weeks ago, my daughter’s gym opened up, and my wife and I decided to send her back to practice. I posted on Facebook a pic of her going back to practice like it was the first day of school(don’t act like I was the only one). As soon as the picture posted, I received a flood of text messages asking me why I was sending my daughter back and if I thought it was too early. In short, the answers to those questions were “we felt it was time” andddddd “don’t know,” but the real question and the topic of this blog is, how did we arrive at our decision. In this blog, I am not going to act like I have all the answers. How and when a person restarts life in the “new normal” is a personal decision and will be dictated mainly on household circumstances. In this blog, I am only going to talk about my thinking, so take it with a grain of salt. 

Before we get started, I want to send a shoutout to Triniti Montgomery for being selected GDN Apparel Student-Athlete for June. Triniti is a soon to be  Level 9 gymnast. To learn more about Triniti, and to watch some of her Level 8 performances visit HERE. 

Also, we would like to let you know about a new platform we are building. We are in the process of developing a platform for gymnasts to build their own personal recruiting profiles. If you are interested in learning more, please visit.  We are giving away 25 free profiles, so the sooner you sign up, the better chance you have to get a freebie profile. To learn more visit HERE.   Now, on with the show.   

The new way of doing things.

I called this blog “Back To The New Normal” because much of what is being asked of us to reduce the risk of contracting the Coronavirus are common sense. Growing up, we stayed using the term “give me my personal space.” I can’t count the number of times my momma told me “get up out my face with you smelling like outside and stop beggin,” I still have no idea what “smellin like outside” means. Little did I know she was training me to survive the COVID-19 pandemic, thanks mom(sarcasm). In my opinion(no, I am not Dr. Fauci), this virus isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. Regardless of which side of the spectrum you fall on politically, one thing most can agree on is that this virus is whipping every government’s ass in the world. I am not talking about just the typical beatdown, I am talking about that Debo, you stole my bike kind of beatdown.

Since we really have no end game in sight, I think the next best step is to figure out how to go about life while operating under the constant threat of the Coronavirus. How do we work in a world where we are no longer top of the food chain. Okay, that was a little dramatic, but I have been dying to use a Walking Dead image, and this is my chance, so I took it. Moving forward, before gymnastics practice, my daughter needs to have her temp taken, take sanitizer with her to practice, and frequently washing her hands at practice. Once she gets home, she hops in the shower for a “just in case” cleansing before she resumes her day job as the resident couch potato. That’s our new reality, good, bad, or ugly. It is what we are stuck with for the time being if she wants to do gymnastics.  

Paralyzed By Fear

This pandemic has everyone shook and for a good reason, but the fear of the unknown is often worse than the reality of the situation itself. Don’t get me wrong, the risk and consequences of catching the Coronavirus are real, but what we had to do to mitigate that risk was beginning to make me feel paralyzed. My entire decision-making process revolved around how to avoid getting “tha Rona.” I realized that some of the choices I was making I wasn’t even leveraging the limited information I had about the virus to make those decisions. Even with my track team, we have families who are not planning on returning until they feel comfortable. But when you ask them what will make them feel comfortable, you get ………………….. This is not a typo, or me falling asleep while pressing the period key.   This is literally their response when you ask them the question.

The truth is, I can’t operate under those conditions. When deciding to go back to the gym, we asked two simple questions as parents. This first question was what has changed, and the second question is, “what can change enough for me to be comfortable.” Since the answer to both those questions was “nothing,” my wife and I each said….

Close the gap or widen the lead.

In truth, I am a competitor, that is one of the reasons why I got into coaching. The Coronavirus has created a unique opportunity for athletes on the lower end of the totem pole performance-wise to close the gap on their competitors. For athletes already on the top end, it creates an opportunity for those athletes to widen the gap.  Eventually, everyone will get back to competing. It will be a hard pill to swallow to watch your athlete take an ass whooping by an athlete they were beating pre-Corona (but you didn’t hear that from me).

Necessity is the mother of Innovation 

In closing, this is our new normal. As the earth warms, things that were once unknown are starting to creep up to the surface. As humans begin to build further out into unknown territories, we increase the risk of being exposed to these new things, some of which may be deadly. At the rate we are moving, it is just a matter of time before we run into Sasquatch. Our new normal will require both families and sports teams to become innovative in the way we approach training and development while still mitigating the risk of contracting diseases. It will be interesting to see how gymnastics competitions adapt post COVID-19. 

For those out there that still think it is too early to return, I understand entirely. As I said at the onset, returning to the New Normal should be utterly dependent on each household’s ability to handle the worst-case scenario. My only suggestion is that when you make your decision, don’t make your decision out of fear, make your decision with an expected outcome in mind.   At least, that is what we did.

Free Shipping Alert!

We are offering free shipping on all our apparel.  Just use code :FREESHIP   Visit gdswagshop.com to see what we have in stock.

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Do Zoom Practice Sessions Really Work?

Welcome back parents to another installment of Gymnastics Dad. In this blog, I am going to answer the question do Zoom(virtual) practices really work, and should you pay for them? For those that don’t know what Zoom is. Zoom is a software used for video conferencing. Since this pandemic has taken off, Zoom has become the premier software for teachers. Zoom is the reason why most parents are going to end up in summer school with their child. Zoom must be the luckiest of the lucky as far as companies go. I mean damn, January 30th Zoom was just another tech company barely hanging on….90 days later this is the founder.

Before I get started, I want to send a big shoutout to all our frontline workers. You guys are the best people on the planet, bar none! GD Nation and I genuinely appreciate everything you have done and are continuing to do for us

I also want to take a moment to send a shoutout to Makayla Fernander. She is the GDN Apparel Athlete Spotlight for May. To learn more about Makayla, please visit here. 

If you want to learn more about how to get your gymnast selected for an athlete spotlight, visit www.gdswagshop.com. Now on to our regularly scheduled programming.

This is a topic I received from a reader because their coach is beginning to charge for virtual practice over Zoom. Her question was, “does the amount of training and the quality of training justify the cost.” She was apprehensive because she felt that since she paid $275.00 monthly when her daughter was going to the gym four times a week, four hours a day, but now the coach is charging $175.00 for three days a week and 2 hours a day. Initially, when she gave me the price tag, my first response was “hell-to-the-no” because, from a straight numbers standpoint, the math didn’t make cents( get it C-E-N-T-S).  After sitting back and weighing the pros vs. cons, I persuaded myself to go in the other direction. This was one of those situations that will be different depending on the family and training situations at home. Before I get started with why I changed my view on the question, Let’s set the mood “ole skool” rap appropriate for this blog.  “Yeah, All I wanna do is zoom-zoom-zoom-zoom and a boom-boom.”  

In a nutshell

Let me say at the onset that I am a firm believer in Zoom meetings and not because I am a coach who does them. In truth, with my track team’s Zoom sessions, we don’t charge the parents for them. That is not to say coaches who do charge are in the wrong. I just don’t because, for me, coaching track and field is a past time and truly “voluntary.” Basically, I don’t view it as a business, but if I did, I’d “shonuff” would charge. I do pay for my daughter’s gymnastics practices over Zoom with no reservations. When moving from what we call “Brick and Mortar” training to virtual training, there isn’t going to be a one-to-one relationship in regards to cost. By design, the goal of technology is to increase efficiencies and value while reducing costs(Geek Talk). So it should be expected that there won’t be a one-to-one relationship when comparing pricing for Brick and Mortar and Virtual. If you look at Zoom Practice sessions from a value standpoint as opposed to a cost standpoint, then it may make more “cents” (I did it again). 

If you read and agree with my last blog, Stay Ready So You Don’t Have To Get Ready. Then you understand that it can be challenging for an athlete to maintain focus outside of the purview of the coach. This pandemic has created a situation where athletes have been left to their own devices in regards to staying motivated. Over the past couple months of having been apart of virtual practices, I have begun to see some added benefits that I initially didn’t consider in regards to virtual training.

Keeps consistency for the athletes

One of the most important aspects of training and development is consistency. The fastest way to get written off by a coach is to be inconsistent. Inconsistency applies to both being inconsistent with practice and inconsistent with focus. Inconsistency is one of the biggest killers of athlete potential. What this pandemic has created is fertile ground for the diseases of inconsistency and laziness to flourish. Having virtual practice establishes a way for an athlete to develop consistent training routines. When coaches establish a routine even if it is virtual, they are establishing consistency for the athletes. The routine helps to get athletes back in the mode of a standardized training regimen.  

Coaches still have influence.  

Can you relate to this? “I have been fussing and fussing at my athlete for the last couple of weeks, and it has had no effect. Then her coach does a zoom session, and now she is all involved.” Well, if you can relate, don’t feel bad. This is actually pretty common amongst all sports. Keep in mind to most of our children our role is mom and dad, not a coach. The term coach carries a special meaning with it. The term “coach” can strike fear in the soul of an athlete. Coaches have the ability to flex muscles that parents don’t have. In my last blog, Stay Ready So You Don’t Have To Get Ready, I talk about how many times a coach’s ability to teach a sport is not the overriding factor when determining a good coach. In many situations, a coach’s value is in their ability to motivate and bring out the best in an athlete. Even though I am a coach, it is difficult for me to garner the same reaction from my daughter that I do from my athletes in regards to training. To my athletes, I am Coach Mike, the monster, but to my daughter, I am “this dude.”

Can’t do as much but can focus on details

Want to keep laziness in check, get called out by your coach in a Zoom session. On Zoom, you don’t have to worry about who is around when you get chewed out because EVERYONE IS AROUND. One of the good things about Zoom meetings is that as a coach, you can see everything. My daughter has been called out many times for straight legs; it is ridiculous. Virtual session has allowed coaches to focus their view on one area instead of having to keep an eye on multiple events. 

Do you have other options

Lastly, the real question is, do you have another option to reliably get your athlete the training they need? If the answer to that question is “no,” then you need to pony up the money to get the training done correctly(assuming you have it to spare). If you haven’t been consistent with training your athlete thus far, then it is unrealistic that you will maintain the level of training provided in the virtual practice. I was asked why I decided to pay for my daughter’s virtual training seeing that I was a coach and understood general fitness and how to train young athletes. My answer was that after observing my daughter’s training session, I realized that they were doing a lot of sport-specific training that I wasn’t familiar with. At that point, I knew it would behoove me to pay for the training and make sure my daughter got the training she needed. With my daughter being in Level 9, I couldn’t afford to “muck this up.” So I had to know when to fold ’em.  Basically, my daughter’s coach had her doing all types of drills that I had no idea needed to be done.  As much money as this expensive ass sport has cost me over the years you think I am going to complain now over $150.00, sheeeeeeeeeiiiiiiiiiittttttttt!!! 

 

In Closing

In the words of the late great Kenny Rogers….

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The post Zoom Training Sessions And Do They Work? appeared first on Gymnastics Dad.

 Hey, Gymnastics Dad Nation, and welcome back to another blog. First and foremost, I want to give a big shoutout to all our frontline workers. You guys are the most amazing people on the planet, bar none! GD Nation and I genuinely appreciate everything you have done and are continuing to do for us. Since the world seems currently on house arrest due to the Coronavirus, I figured I’d write a quick blog to give GD Nation something to do besides vegging out on Netflix’s. As a blogger, you realize how much your daily interactions in life impact your blogging. When something like a pandemic takes out your daily routine and communications, so too goes what you blog about. Being a blogger during a pandemic in the area of youth gymnastics is not easy. I try to strike a balance between providing interesting material to read yet, avoiding being a painful reminder that sports have been temporarily stripped from us. Fortunately, the idea of this blog came after having a conversation with the fam while having breakfast. 

 Before we get started, I want to send a shoutout to Connor Preston. He is the first athlete selected in our new monthly feature at GDN Apparel called Gymnast Spotlight. He was actually the gymnast for March and was slotted to be featured in March’s blogs, but then the Coronavirus blew everything up. Moving forward, every month, we will spotlight a different gymnast for their accomplishments in and outside the sport of gymnastics. To learn more about Connor, please visit here. Now on to our regularly scheduled programming.

 ~The Scene (Picture this….)~

It’s a Sunday morning, and I finally decide to get motivated to cook breakfast around 11:30 am. I mean, the family has to eat, right? After surviving a mental flogging from my wife over the fact that I continue to wash clothes but never fold or put them away, can we sit down to eat. The minute my wife says, “would you mind…” I know sh$t is about to go all the way left. fellas, FYI, “would you mind” is code for “I have told his ass about this a million times, and he keeps doing it.” But, I did manage to talk my way out by leveraging an”ole skool” strategy of “if you can’t dazzle them with brilliance, then baffle them with bullcrap.” After munching down a few pieces of bacon, I looked over to my daughter and said to her, “Hey, girly, you ready to head back to practice yet.” Her response was “kinda, but I am not feeling that double back on the beam yet.” At that point, I realize her statement gave me an opening to satisfy my coaching fix. Still, I needed to do a balancing act between being a coach and a dad. I figure this is an excellent time to dip into coaching mode and explain to her the benefits of preparation and reducing the amount of rust when getting back in gymnastics shape. For the last 3 weeks, her gymnastics coaches have been doing a virtual practice, which is fantastic. In conjunction with the coach’s practices, we have had a conditioning plan in place since they shut down the state. Still, even with that, my internal coaching clock is starting to tell me that we need to kick it up a notch. 

~The Convo ~

Our conversation that morning was about preparation. In a nutshell, I was trying to express to my daughter the importance of staying ready, so she doesn’t have to get ready when she returns to gymnastics. This pandemic has created a situation where young athletes have to rely heavily on household discipline and dedication to maintain focus on training. Continuing to train outside of the purview of coaches can be difficult for anybody. If you come from a household where general fitness is not typically a priority, it is almost impossible to maintain. In sports, it is not always about the training ability of a coach. In many instances, parents are looking for someone who can motivate their children. They are looking for someone who can have those hard conversations with their kids. In a nutshell, parents are quite honestly looking for someone who can get in their “kiddos” asses and motivate them to be better athletes and people. Being able to manage training during this pandemic will give athletes a considerable advantage when returning. 

~The Timeline~

The game is simple, reduce the amount of time it takes to get back into prime gymnastics training shape. The faster an athlete can get back in shape, the quicker they can get back to sport-specific training. At breakfast, I told my daughter that most people don’t consider how condensed their timeline to competition season will be when they return back to the gym. I told her to factor in the traditional schedule to the first competition and then decrease time due to the pandemic. For every one week that an athlete eats terrible and doesn’t exercise, then that is additional two weeks of work to get back in shape. The negative impact of lack of training can be exponential, depending on the athlete and the family situation. For my daughter, who is moving to Level 9, her first meet is typically around the first week of December. If the meet time frame doesn’t change, that means currently, if they return back to training in June, we will lose approximately two months of training time that need to be accounted for. This pandemic is condensing every sport’s training schedule. With that being said, it would behoove both athletes and parents to reduce the conditioning curve as much as possible. The goal is to expedite and reduce the time that needs to be allocated for general conditioning. 

~The Top Athletes Are Training~

The second item I bought to her attention is that the top athletes are still training. There is one thing that is always universal when situations like this occur. The beasts will always train. Winners figure out how to get training regardless of the conditions, remember Rocky, the Russian, and running in the snow? Let’s not act like I am the only one that watched Rocky movies back in the day. Old heads, this is the point in the blog you start humming the words “there’s no easy way out, there’s no short cut home…” from the Rocky soundtrack. Since this pandemic, there have been hundreds of youtube videos posting with people creating homemade strength equipment. Depending on your craftsman skills, I am not necessarily advocating building your own vault or bars. What I am saying is that “winners figure it out.” If you have read my blog, Talented vs. Hardworking, then you know I believe hard work will always outweigh talent in the long run. This pandemic has created an environment that is ideal for any athlete who values working hard. This pandemic will give hard-working athletes a chance to separate themselves from the pack. The more innovative and creative you can be to overcome training challenges, the further ahead you will be of your competition.

 Lastly, this is a tough time for everyone, but as the old adage goes….. This Too Shall Pass. Until this passes, set up a routine with your athlete and stick to it. Challenge your athlete to keep that mental and physical edge by focusing on the basics. Remember, hard work doesn’t require equipment, effort doesn’t require a building and dedication doesn’t require a coach.  

 In closing, once this pandemic is over, gymnasts will want to show up to practice like it is the first day of school. Might as well let them show up in style! Check out our new Beauty and the Beast collection at our GDN Apparel Swag Shop. 

The post Stay Ready So You Don’t Have To Get Ready. appeared first on Gymnastics Dad.

What Do Parents Value More

Welcome back to another installment of the Gymnastics Dad blog. Since I last blogged, my daughter has now completed four competitions at Level 8 and let me say, “gymnastics is hard as a mofo.” The judges in Level 8 are heartless. When I say the judges are heartless, I mean like Ice King, White Walker cruel. I saw them give someone a score of 4.6, now that is just cold-blooded. Here is a photo I took of our last competition judges walking into the meet.

So far, this season has been tough, and there are several factors that go into that, but the biggest factor is probably as the old saying goes “you can’t ride the wave all the time, periodically the waves break and you have to tread water until another wave comes.”  

Anywho, on to the blog. In this blog, I am going to try to answer a burning question that is always in the back of a coach’s mind, and that question is, “How much do parents value development?” In order to answer that question, we actually have to answer a couple of sub-questions. The first question we have to answer is, which is more important to a parent, is it development, the score, or their image? The second question we have to answer is, “Does a score illustrate competency.”  

How Much Do Parents Really Value Development

From a coach’s standpoint, development is always the number one priority. Good coaches will always be end game driven, which, by default, favors development. The real question is, does focusing on growth mesh with a parent’s expectations. Now, as you are reading this, you are probably thinking, “duh, of course, I want my athlete to develop,” so let me ask the question differently. What are you willing to give up for your athlete to develop? What happens if the development requires your athlete to take a step back in performance, are you game? What happens if that development requires your athlete to repeat a level? Are you still game, kinda, sorta, not really. The truth is development is ugly and a rough road for parents. It consists of crashes, falls, terrible scores, WTFs, bumps, bruises and ice packs, lots and lots of ice packs. Development is painful for parents because it consists of parents having to lower and manage their expectations. Growth requires that sometimes parents will have to concede that what is best for their athlete may not necessarily coincide with keeping pace with the other team parents(damn, I really went there). I know this is going to sound crazy, but it is much easier to win than to develop, and that is why winning doesn’t necessarily equate to being good. Winning and losing can be manipulated by several factors. Coaches who want to get better scores will often seek out less competitive meets or meets where the judges tend to evaluate easier. They will water down routines. In general, growth should always be the priority, but the truth of the matter is growth requires patience and trust in your coach. Growth also requires parents to stay in their lanes, which is quite often the most challenging issue.  

 The second part of this first question is can both those qualities co-exist. Meaning, can an athlete win and show a high level of development at the same time. The answer to that question is that it depends. In the early stages of growth, being able to win and develop can be difficult because their training maturity is already very low. As an athlete’s training maturity improves, then the chances of progressing and winning at the same time are much more likely. The reason is as an athlete matures training-wise, their body and their mind can process information much quicker, which means learning something new is not as severe. 

Does A Score Illustrate Competency

Of all the sports I have been apart of. There are specific terms that seem only to pertain to the sport of gymnastics. Since becoming a part of the gymnastics world, I have heard words like “a true level xx” or “that gymnast is doing all level xx skills,” which kinda means the same thing. I always thought that you are an X Level gymnast, or you are not, but apparently, I was wrong. So the question is if a person scores high but isn’t doing true level skills, then does the score illustrate their real competency for that level? You might be asking what does this question have to do with answering the overarching question? Simple, if a parent embraces the fact that their athlete can be considered a Level XX without having to acquire the skills for that level, then can a parent say they honestly embrace development. We all know parents who are more concerned with their athletes being at a certain level than actually being competent at that level. Every athlete can’t be good at everything. I get that. What I am referring to is when an athlete isn’t essentially prepared to be competitive at a level based on their fundamentals, but the parent pushes anyway for image reasons. At the end of the day, if competency isn’t high on a parent’s priority list, then neither is development because the two go hand and hand.  

In the end, whether a parent values development or not is not a matter of right or wrong, but knowing what you value helps to level-set expectations with the coach and the athlete. Most coaches already know what you prioritize by your actions. It is effortless to see a parent’s true intentions by the way they react to non-positive news about their athlete.

In closing, I know this may piss some parents off, but it was not meant to be. My goal was to address one of the many “elephants in the room” when it comes to gymnastics. I also want to allow parents to dive into the mind of a coach when it comes to specific issues. Although I am not a gymnastics coach, the principles of coaching are all the same regardless of the sport.  

 The next blog is already written, so stay tune. No title yet, but in it, I talk about the negative impact on a team when the water cooler talk always revolves around an injury. Here is a quick snippet.  

I have a saying on my track team it goes “suffer in silence.” What that means is that if you are hurting or sore, the world doesn’t need to know you are hurting or sore.” An athlete that is always hurt is deemed unreliable by a coach. A parent who is always looking for special treatment for a sore athlete is considered high maintenance. Both can be very draining or an organization.

Lastly, are you tired of the same old bland gymnastics swag and are looking for something unique that will have you looking flawless at competitions, welp check us out at https://gdswagshop.com/ and follow us on IG at https://www.instagram.com/gdnapparel for discounts, coupons, and contest.  The spring line-up is coming out soon.    

If you like reading ya boy’s stuff then show me some love and sign-up for my newsletter so these blogs can come right to your inbox.

Until next time, peace and soul….

The post Growth vs. Image appeared first on Gymnastics Dad.

Hey people, welcome back from the holidays, and I hope everyone enjoyed their time with friends and family. For me, food is always the best part of the season. Below is actual footage someone caught of me eating at Thanksgiving dinner. 

A couple of quick hits before we get started with the blog. First, if you submitted an Ambassador application for GDN Apparel, we have begun the review process of those applications, so please have patience we will follow-up accordingly. Second, we are releasing our gymnast profiles platform (gymnastsprofiles.com) pretty soon, and we are looking for beta testers. If you are interested in setting up a free profile page for your gymnast and be a beta-tester, please submit your information here. If you are selected to be an Ambassador, there is no need to apply for a profile because ambassadors will automatically receive a profile account. Any-who on to the blog. The topic of this blog was sent in by a reader. Her question was, “how can she identify if her daughter is at a good gym?”

Welp, that is a great question, and the answer largely depends on what is the ultimate goal for your athlete. If you are doing gymnastics primarily for recreation, then honestly, most any gym will do.  If you are looking for something more, then choosing the right gym is critical to your gymnast’s development and overall success. Although picking the right gym is a personal decision, I believe there are certain qualities all good programs should have regardless of the sport.   

Communication, Communication, Communication

Good programs communicate. This includes ownership, coaches and all the way down to the booster club. When dealing with youth sports, you are dealing with the three things that will get “yo ass whooped” by parents. Their time, their money, and last but not least, their children. The best way to avoid getting cussed out by parents is by over-communicating with them. Having open lines of communication also allows for an easier time when having to have an awkward conversation. Below an example of an uncomfortable conversation, I had with a parent on my track team. This conversation could have gone in the wrong direction. Fortunately, I already had an open line of communication with the mother from previous discussions so we ended up in a good place. 

It’s not about the money

Good programs don’t coach to the financial bottom line. This is one of the hardest things for organizations to avoid, especially if there is a lot of overhead involved with your team. The truth is there is an obscene amount of money in youth sports, and cash is a very potent drug. One of the reasons there is so much money in youth sports is that parents will pay almost any amount for their child to “look” successful. Once a gym starts catering to the highest bidder, it becomes challenging to run a program with integrity. Parents will begin to question a coach’s motives and decision making, and at that point, the gym is pretty much a sinking ship. Queue that band from the Titanic. 

Expectations define Culture and Culture defines identity

All programs want to establish an identity, but good programs understand that they first must establish a culture that fosters that identity. It isn’t very easy to establish a solid identity since before you build your identity, you have to create a culture. To create a winning culture, you have to be willing to lose people. Parents or athletes who can’t fit into the culture have to bounce. At our old gym, Coach Irina would tell lazy athletes, “train or go home.” Parents on the cutting end of that statement would get mad. Some will say that the coach was being too harsh, and make statements like ”I paid my money…”. Parents, you paid your money for the coach to develop your child not to babysit. What the coach was actually doing was trying to establish a certain level of expectation amongst her team. The expectation was simple “you either worked your tail off or go kick rocks.” Over time we began to have a lot of parents leave for other gyms. Watching profit walk out the door is always tough, believe you me, but “not all money is good money,” and sometimes there is an addition by subtraction. They needed 100% buy-in for this transformation to take place. If the athlete went too many days not focusing, then Coach Irina called that parent into the principle’s office.   Make too many mistakes in practice if you want too, coaches handed out rope climbs like Skittles on Halloween. There would be days where it seemed like the whole entire optional team would leave the gym crying. Lord forbid, we collectively had a bad meet, mandatory Saturday practice, “bruh, seriously.” At face value, our environment looked harsh until we started winning. Once athletes started showing progress, the buy-in happened naturally, and that is when the culture started changing. 

Once the culture was in place, winning became the expectation. The athletes started holding each other accountable in practice. Pre-meet, my daughter’s level would hold a “get ya mind right” gymnasts only meeting where no parents or coaches were allowed. In a nutshell, winning became our level’s identity. 

Reward those who work hard and perform well

Fair does not always mean equal. Good programs understand how to incentivize their athletes to compete better. When the higher-performing athletes are treated the same as the lower performing athletes, what is the motivation for lower-performing athletes to work harder? At the end of the day, if you play in a competitive sport, winning is the ultimate goal. Victory or succeeding validates hard work, effort, focus and practice. It proves the coach’s instructions and training. It confirms for parents that their time and money are smartly invested. Good programs understand the value of winning. Consequently, a good program also values those who can help them accomplish the goal of winning. 

Coaches own the lost

In good programs, the coach will typically own bad performances.  There are times where “s#$t happens”, like an inadvertent fall on a basic skill or a skill that a gymnast has performed a million times with no problem.  In those situations, it is no one’s fault just bad luck. I am referring to the stuff that should have been developed and wasn’t. I hate losing. Actually, I despise losing, but for most good coaches losing is not solely an athlete thing. It is an “us or we” thing. I hate to see coaches pass the buck of a lost or lousy performance to an athlete. “Bruh, real talk, you coached that crappy performance, now own that shit.” Whether it was lack of oversight or just all around neglect, coaches are equally as responsible for the lousy performance than the athletes and parents are. If an athlete isn’t ready to compete, then don’t put them out there. Once an athlete starts to compete, the spectators have no clue that that athlete wasn’t focused in practice. They have no idea how many hours of practice the athlete missed.  They also don’t know that you went against your own best judgment and put an athlete out there that wasn’t ready to perform because you were trying to appease the parents(ahem). The only thing they know is that that athlete performed bad and was trained by <insert name here>. The good programs value their reputation, and to preserve their rep, they will not put a poor representation of their work in the spotlight. 

Lastly, good programs have a great culture among parents.  As the owner of a team, I tell my parents at the start of a season that I expect everyone to get along and find something they have in common. It is not an option on my team it is a requirement.   We spend too many hours together to not be able to fellowship and break bread together. Our old gym had a great culture for the most part. It was sort of a watering hole for the community. You see it in the way parents would come to the gym one-two hours early just to hang out and fellowship.  I talked to people from all socioeconomic backgrounds and all walks of life. If you were in the gym then we had something in common. Our kids were either a gymnast or aspiring gymnasts and that was enough to converse about. 

Lastly lastly, are you tired of the same old bland gymnastics swag and are looking for something unique that will have you looking flawless at competitions, welp check us out at https://gdswagshop.com/ and follow us on IG at https://www.instagram.com/gdnapparel for discounts, coupons, and contest.     

If you like reading ya boy’s stuff then show me some love and sign-up for my newsletter so these blogs can come right to your inbox.

Until next time, peace and soul….

The post Finding The Perfect Gym appeared first on Gymnastics Dad.

Welcome back parents, it’s me, “dat dude,” Gymnastics Dad. Here we are the start of another gymnastics season.   A new season brings with it a roller coaster of emotions.  The highs and lows of a competition season can be difficult to manage, so I figured now would be a good time to give you some of the coping mechanisms that I use for dealing with competitions early in the season. Around this time is where parents start showing up to practice more, start asking questions about the status of the floor routine, and wondering/hoping/praying/begging that their gymnasts will be ready for the first meet.  The lead up to a competitive season is the time when a parent’s blood pressure starts to creep up with every slip of the beam, fall off the bars, or stumble on a pass. Coaches start holding “mandatory” mini-camps and parents start complaining about the additional expense given that the season is so close and wondering why the stuff covered in camp can’t be or wasn’t included in practice, tell me I am lying. To cope with all this stress, parents deploy several tactics, many of them requiring a frosty alcoholic beverage. Although I am a fan of the occasional “drank” now and then, this is not one of those moments. So here we go!

Know what your athletes can’t do.

The first coping skill to not blowing a gasket at the first meet is knowledge. Knowing what your athlete is struggling with will help to level-set your expectations. The worst thing you can do is go to a competition expecting to see a 2019 version of Mary Lou Retton or a mini version of Simone Biles and instead end up getting, let’s just say, not them. If your gymnast is anything like my child, then your conversation on the way home from practice goes a little something like this:

Me:  How was practice?

Daughter: Good, can I use your phone?
Me: Why?

Daughter: MaKayla is online with Roblox on her way home
Me: here(phone handed over), what did you work on today?

Daughter: Everything except <insert event here>

Me: Did you try anything new today, or did you practice your routines

Daughter: No

Me: no what?

Daughter: we kinda worked on routines but we mostly did skills

Me: Did the coaches say anything to you today

Daughter: They always say something(sarcasm)

Me: I know that…but did they give you any specific feedback?

Daughter: no, not really, they said just stuff…but <insert name here> kept hogging the beam

Me: Okay, don’t care about “such-and-such” hogging the beam especially given the fact there are 20 other ones you could use.  What exactly did the coaches say?

Daughter: Can’t remember, just stuff
Me: You know what little girl…

Daughter: Dadddddddddddddddyyyyyyyyyyyy (getting frustrated at all the questions)  

Me: ………..what do you want for dinner

This conversation pretty much sums up everything I can get out of my child in regards to practice. If you are in a similar situation, then attending practices is the best thing you can do to help your sanity.  I am amazed when I see parents who never sat in on their athlete’s training but come to a competition and get pissed if it doesn’t meet their expectations. My daughter’s tuition is $300.00 per month, which is equivalent to a car note. Bruh, at that cost, gymnastics is no longer a recreational sport. Gymnastics is an investment at that point, and I want to know if my investment is paying off.

All Meets Are Not Created Equal

The second thing parents need to be aware of to survive their first meet is to understand that all competitions are not created equal. Regardless of the sports most early-season competitions are used to knock the rust off and to test new skills and techniques. After the first competition, you typically see a more defined focus by the coaches and the athletes. The reason for this is that it is challenging to simulate live competition in practice or even a mock meet. There is something about seeing someone in a different uniform than you that brings out that competitive spirit. It is not to say the first meet isn’t important but understand that part of the value of the first meet is to know where an athlete is, where they need work. Use the first meet as an opportunity to compete against someone other than their teammates and to grow.

Taking an “L” isn’t the end of the world

The two techniques I mentioned above are the main techniques I use to survive a meet. Unfortunately, there is a massive opportunity for your gymnast to catch a beatdown at the first meet. There are just too many factors that could affect the outcome of a competition. Also, let’s not forget about the infamous Susan, last name “wheredidyoucomefrom.” She is always that gymnast that comes out of nowhere like she is some type of superhero and lays the smackdown with a ridiculously good score, and parents are left wondering where in the “frazzle snickets” did she come from. You look her up on mymeetscores to see two rows of competition results from Xcel Bronze and her all-around for those two results are 30.3 and a 31.2. The truth is, taking a beatdown that the first meet is not the end of the world. It is a wakeup call for both coaches, parents, and athletes.   

Last but not least, if you decide none of these coping mechanisms are going to help you and you still are going to be stressed, then at least look good being stressed.  Please visit our swag shop at www.gdswagshop.com where we specialize in gymnastics spirit wear. We have something for everyone, and we remembered the hubby too. We will be giving away 12 shirts through the remainder of November and up until Christmas day, so please signup for our newsletter and follow us on Instagram @ https://www.instagram.com/gymnastic_dad and Facebook so you will be in the loop for our contests.

If you like reading ya boy’s stuff then show me some love and sign-up for my newsletter so these blogs can come right to your inbox.

Until next time, peace and soul…. 

The post Surviving the first meet. appeared first on Gymnastics Dad.

Fellow readers, I am happy to announce that after months of hard work, we are ready to release our new clothing brand GDN Apparel(Link). GDN stands for Gymnastics Dad Nation.  Our goal at GDN Apparel is to offer new and unique gymnastics swag to parents and gymnasts. Dads, we made sure not to forget you in our designs. I grew tired of the dad shirts that show the old cliches like “she flips I pay” and “my gymnast’s ATM.” I wanted something different that didn’t revolve around me sacrificing an arm and a leg for gymnastics. Moms and Dads, I guarantee you that we have something that will have you saying “yep, I can rock that.” Make sure to sign up for the newsletter and follow us on Instagram @gdnapparel and @gymnastic_dad to stay in the loop with new releases, discounts, coupons, and contests. Now onto our regularly scheduled programming. 

Dealing with coaches when an issue arises can be some of the most challenging terrains to navigate in youth sports. I decided to write this blog based on a conversation I had with another parent whose child does gymnastics. Their issue was with the development of their gymnasts or the perceived lack thereof.   She wanted to talk to the coaches but was struggling with finding a way to broach the conversation. She also struggled with if it was appropriate to discuss her concerns with the coaches because she wasn’t sure how they would receive it and if there would be blowback for her gymnast.      

Parents, I am a coach, and as much as it pains me to say it, coaches do get stuff wrong. We are humans, and therefore we are flawed. We get lazy, careless, and complacent. We have favorites and also have athletes that we don’t care for, which impacts how dedicated we are to those athletes. The difference between good coaches and bad coaches is that a good coach understands the nature of being human and consistently works against the natural negative tendencies that come with that. Therefore, it is not unrealistic for a coach to “drop the ball” periodically, and it is also not unrealistic for a parent to catch it and question it. A parent has every right to seek knowledge from a coach. Notice I alluded to seeking understanding and not doubting the coaching which is two completely different things. I have a saying as a coach “if you could coach ’em you would coach ’em, but you can’t coach ’em so don’t try to coach ’em on my watch.” What I am saying is although parents shouldn’t question training techniques, parents have a right to seek understanding in regards to the development of their athletes in general.  

I know coaches who tend to want parents to have a hands-off approach when it comes to training, development and any other oversight when the athlete is under their direction. Limiting parents is smart but coaches, be careful what you ask for. If you request that parent to be hands-off then also be prepared to handle the blowback if that athlete isn’t as successful as the parents expect them to be. In my opinion, parents serve as another set of eyes for me at practice. I can’t tell you how many times I have heard a parent scream out “why are you walking <insert name here>.” Instantly, I turn around and look at the athlete like “you know you messed upright.” (menace to society fans). I know track and field and gymnastics are entirely different sports, but the same logic applies. How many gymnastic parents have had the proverbial “Come to Jesus” conversation when their child is caught goofing off at practice.  I don’t need parents to help me coach their athletes but I do value them letting me know when kids are not on task. 

If you read my blog(Bucket of issues) you know that as an owner of a team I have learned that parent issues tend to fall into four buckets. Those buckets are education, communication, expectation, and personality. Whenever and issue arises, I try to assign the matter to a particular bucket which drives the way I address the issue. In most cases, issues revolving around training usually fall into the education and expectation buckets. The education buckets and expectation buckets are the reason why I believe every parent has every right to request a certain level of “understanding” regarding training and development from a coach.  Some problems are easy to resolve with a simple clarification of the development process. Sometimes I have to tell parents something as simple as “look dawg, they are only ten years old” and that backs parents off of the edge. Often, I have to tell parents that they are not seeing their child through a realistic view at this stage in their development.  

Triple Constraints

I stole this term Triple Constraints(TC) from the field of project management. In project management, TC refers to the conditions required for a project to be successful. The TC of project management is time, resources and scope. As one aspect changes the other two much adjust accordingly.  In youth coaching, the triple constraints refer to the three pieces that need to be in place for an athlete to be successful. Those pieces are parents, coaches, and athletes. My theory is, that for an athlete to indeed be successful, the coach, parent, and athlete all need to be on the same page and have the same set of expectations. In a perfect world, all three should march to the same drummer, but at a minimum, the coach and parents need to be on the same sheet of music because typically as long as those two are on the same page, the athlete will follow suit. Having an open line of communication with the coach is imperative for TC to work. Asking questions and seeking understanding aids in building that relationship because it also helps to level-set expectations.  

Knowing what you don’t know

Growing up I ran track for my high school and honestly I was pretty good. This is usually around the time when a parent would start exaggerating about their former glory as a high school athlete, but truthfully I was a pretty good runner, seriously! When I started coaching, I realized very quickly I didn’t understand anything about track and field. As a coach, I had to learn terms like dorsiflexion, zero-step, penultimate step, power output and soon I realized how un-informed about the sport I was. Being a “former” superstar has nothing to do with being a good coach, becoming a good coach forces you to take your level of understanding regarding the sport to a new level.  For parents, it is always good to have a basic knowledge of the sport your child is in but in all honestly for an in-depth understanding of the sport, that is what your coach is for. Knowing what you don’t know is the first step to building a line of open communication with a coach because it helps you to understand what questions to ask.

Approaching The Issue With The Coach

Approaching a coach many times feels like a dangerous proposition. One of the best terms a coach could hear from a parent is “help me understand” or “am I looking at this correctly.” These terms lead the coach to the opportunity to educate a parent. Good coaches are inherently teachers at heart so having the opportunity to inform parents is often relished by good coaches.   The more educated a parent becomes, the easier it is for a coach to develop their athlete because what is being taught at practices will also be reinforced at home. 

Accepting the Answer

Lastly, parents need to be okay with the answer to their question. When a parent asks a question, they often have a preconceived notion of what the answer should be. As a parent many times we fail to understand that a solution to an issue may be specific to our athlete but may not be scalable to the whole team. Coaches do look at athletes as individuals, but in a team environment coaches must implement process changes that are scalable to the entire team.  Being cool with the answer doesn’t mean you like the answer, it doesn’t even mean you agree with the answer but it means you respect the answer and can move forward. 

If you like reading ya boy’s stuff then show me some love and sign-up for my newsletter so these blogs can come right to your inbox.

Until next time, peace and soul…. 

The post Addressing Issues With The Coach appeared first on Gymnastics Dad.

Before I get started with this blog, let me say what I am about to write about is not related to specific skills college coaches look for in an athlete.  I am not going to talk about scores or anything else that pertains directly to the technical aspects of the sport of gymnastics. For all that info my hope is your club coach has insight on that, plus you probably would not want my advice anyway.  What I am going to dive into is the part of the recruiting process that parents often overlook but is often critically important to the overall success of an athlete earning a college scholarship. The part that is most overlooked is the recommendation from their current coach.    

Let’s be real, most gymnasts are not the “who’s that chick” type of gymnasts.  You know, that gymnast that after every event parents are like “who the heck is she and where did she come from?  The gymnast that after the awards are given out, you promptly look her up on mymeetscores talking about “did she compete last year?” When you look at the rotation sheet, and you see her team listed your first instinct is to say, “here we go.” As with most sports, there are typically a few of those types of athletes out there, and then there’s everyone else. If your daughter is “that chick” then much of what I am going to write about won’t directly pertain to you because although your gymnast may have a bad attitude, there is most likely going to be some college coach who figures the reward of having your athlete on the team outweighs the risk. For the rest of the regular folks, having a good recommendation from your club coach is super important. The one thing college coaches want to avoid at all costs is a potential “basket case” for an athlete or difficult parents. Coaches only have a certain number of scholarships available, and they want to avoid giving it to someone who may be un-coachable. 

Parents often by default assume that their current coach would give their child a good recommendation, which is not always the case.  Ask yourself this, if your gymnast’s coach had to give an honest assessment regarding your athlete today what would he/she say. Would your coach answer the question right away, or would there be an awkward silence?  

Keep in mind that a coach’s recommendation doesn’t only affect your child but affects the athletes who come after your child that also want to attend that same program.  If a college gets too many subpar athletes from a particular gym, then that coach will most likely start looking at that program with skepticism when it comes to recruiting.  The truth is a coach and a program lives and dies by the number of people they get into college. Why do you think when you go to a competition, recruitment banners showing what gymnasts went to what college is always hanging from the rafters.  You can forever see a parent look up and say, “See, that is what I am talking about.” 

As the reputation of the gym grows, so does the status of the coaches.  Good coaches understand that an excellent reputation is like gold in the coaching world, and they should try to protect it at all costs.  For a coach to protect their reputation, they develop specific mechanisms that would behoove parents to be aware of even if they don’t agree with them. 

Coaches do have favorites

Part of getting a good recommendation is being able to earn a spot on the coach’s infamous “favorite” list.  My guess is right about now parents are gasping thinking “a coach shouldn’t have favorites.” Coaches just like parents have favorites, and if they tell you they don’t then your child might not be one of them. (shots fired) The good news is that for good coaches getting on the “favorite” list is pretty straightforward (in theory).  The answer is, wait for it, wait for it, wait for it, have your gymnast do what the heck they are supposed to do. I have a saying, “coaches see everything but comment on very little.” That means when your coach told your gymnast to do ten full turns, and she only did 8, the coach saw that. When your daughter looked at you and asked you what’s for dinner during practice instead of focusing, yep, coach saw that too.  Or when the coach is giving your daughter instructions, and she is missing half of it because you are trying to coach from the sidelines, the coach saw that too. Let us pause for a moment of silence for the passing of the parent’s pride who are guilty of this. The truth of the matter is coaches want athletes who can follow the simple instructions. No coach can guarantee the “W,” but any coach worth their salt can ensure progress.  Unfortunately, an athlete’s inability to listen and process information is an unnecessary obstacle to that goal.  

A great example of coaches wanting athletes and parents who can follow instructions. My daughter’s coaches have been on a vacation that last two weeks(must be nice).  Embedded in their two-week vacations was a one week vacation for the gymnasts. Before the coaches left they gave some simple instructions for what the athletes needed to do during their week off. Those instructions were for the athletes to record themselves for 30 minutes conditioning using time-lapse on the iPhone and email it to the coaches daily.  Outside of the fact that I am still rocking an iPhone 6+, so you are asking a bit much on the memory tip the request wasn’t too difficult but being a coach, my guess is many athletes did not do it. From a coaching standpoint, my question is simple. If you are not willing to dedicate 30 minutes a day to ensure your athlete fulfills a coaches small request, is it reasonable to ask them to go above and beyond the call of duty for your gymnasts?

Coach Push Other Athletes More Than Others

Here is another truth that may be hard for parents to accept. When it comes to college recruiting coaches will push other athletes more than others.  Everything goes back to reputation. If a coach believes one athlete is more coachable than the other and everything else is even, then it makes sense that a coach would push the athlete that has the highest potential to put them in the best possible light.  For example, as a coach, I have a recruiting relationship with a couple of colleges. Periodically I will get an FB message from a coach asking what I have in the pipe as far as talent. At that point, I have a decision to make. Do I push the athlete that may be marginally more talented, or do I err on the side of the athlete that is more coachable and has a better attitude?  In order not to put myself in that situation I tell parents not to be naive to believe that just because a coach trains their child and they pay their fees that somehow a coach is obligated to give their child a good recommendation. If you think I am exaggerating, below is an actual message I received from a coach.   

In closing the good news is that it doesn’t take much to get and stay on a coach’s good side.  Most coaches want their athletes to be successful, and many cases will go against their better judgment to increase the odds of that happening.  All parents have to do is “help them help you.” If you want to be able to use that money that you were saving for college on something else because your baby earned a college scholarship then in most cases, do what the coaches ask you to do. 

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Until next time, peace and soul…. 

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