A Nabs 1/1

[Doug1233]

Am I getting confused with a full and a 3/2 being “impossible” in pike position?

 

[GymBeauty]

My gravestone will read “Piked Twisting Queen”

 

[Doug1233]

I remember there was the most obvious piked rudi vault about ten years ago and it was given layout credit post the “it’s impossible” rule. Need to find the video. The gymternet went nuts ha.

 

[navyblue]

I mean, mechanically it really isn’t that feasible to get more than 180 degrees of twisting done while piked, what you’ll see is just variations of either a piked entry or exit to the skill. On forward saltos that generally means a piked entry that opens up to allow the twisting (i.e. Sacramone’s vault), and on backward saltos an open twist followed by a pike down to complete it (i.e. Kristal Uzelac’s cool beam series, every single full twisting double pike on floor, and Alexis Brion’s exciting double twisting double pike which I will never tire of watching).

 

[Doug1233]

Absolutely. But a piked entry that opens up to allow the twisting is still a piked skill, no?

 

[navyblue]

I would say yes – and it’s a fairly significant distinction when we’re talking about front saltos or vaults, because a piked entry offers a quite noticeable rotational shortcut into a skill, whereas the heel drive needed to sustain a layout throughout is a bigger challenge. Impressive as Sacramone’s vaulting was, I would have much preferred if she’d maintained a straight body like Vanessa Atler did when originating the vault.

For back saltos it’s not quite as cut and dry though… a pike-down is already a fairly typical deduction for skills that are obviously intended to be layouts… What would we make of Kristal Uzelac’s piked back full on beam? If forced to choose, I’d have this share a box with a back tucked full, rather than evaluated as a layout with a major piking deduction. But that’s the thing, the open-ended code shouldn’t force us to choose… with a tuck full rated an F, it would be perfectly reasonable to rate the pike full as a G, with layout full as an H. Currently, layout full is only worth one measly tenth more than the tucked full, a distinction that doesn’t adequately account for its rarity, or its near impossibility to do from standing like its tucked counterpart.