Random gymnastics questions

[JaJa]

If you want mega tumbles go watch tumbling.

People say that all the time but it is completely unfair. WAG consists of 4 apparatus and most of us love all four or at least 3 of the 4. We do NOT want to just watch tumbling. But we do want to watch big skills especially on FX and Vault. What if I said if you want to watch extreme artistry go to the ballet?

 

[makam]

But if you limit the tumble runs to three or four and had other requirements like they currently do, it wouldn't become a tumble competition. Make them do two different scales and it could become a comedy competition...

 

[KristyJ]

I think a 25' depth might be more limiting than people realize. Yes, most performance stages are rectangular, but they are also generally much larger for established companies-- Lincoln Center, for instance, is 80' x 100'. Skating rinks are rectangular but an Olympic rink is 98' x 197' and it is considered good, even necessary, practice to use diagonals for many things. Sure few variations or dance solos take the whole stage, but if we want to compare to spaces that allow for wide artistic movement, 25' can be very shallow and 40' depth will easily be used. I'm almost certain athletes would use the diagonals for tumbling anyways. They will fill and overfill any amount of space allotted them.

 

[Denn]

Disagree. You can't compare floor exercise mats to professional performance stages designed for huge production sets and large performance ensembles. Or to rinks for a sport that involves gliding. In fact, the only movement for which we see gymnasts use the 40' width are hideous leap "passages" with 8 million chassés.

Not to mention, 25' x 64' still has diagonals — AND other lines. In fact, guess how long it is from one corner to the opposite side's middle? Yep, it's 40 feet. And there's 4 of them to choose from.

I'm sorry, but these comments about it only going left to right or about it turning into tumbling are just crazy. Is this your real belief? Or are you used to 40 x 40 and struggling with the idea of changing it? We changed the vault table — and some people wailed about it at first — but now look where we are. It's been wonderful.

BTW, a longer tumbling space that allows gymnasts to more easily fit two big saltos in the same pass without risking going out of bounds might actually decrease the number of tumbling passes for some gymnasts (especially the men), giving more time for dance. Remember, they still have to count 3 dance elements.

 

[KristyJ]

I do think we need go no farther than the 80s and 90s compulsories that used the full 40' of the floor well for choreography, and certainly others also have over time

 

[Denn]

I do think we need go no farther than the 80s and 90s compulsories that used the full 40' of the floor well for choreography, and certainly others also have over time

But as I said, there's still plenty of 40' lines in a 25 by 64 space.

 

[Bob]

I honestly believe it would lead to more focus on big tumbling and less artistry and I think the balance is already for tumbling. That's just my opinion, which I am entitled to. I see no reason why the square floor cannot achieve a balance of the 2. I can't see any advantage of making a landing strip shape. I think coaches will just think " ooooh we need to focus more on tumbling".

 

[youwannacranson]

Wouldn't the 65" length be a mere 8.5 feet longer than the current diagonals? That's not even two extra strides for most of them

Everybody would start using the (awkward rectangular) diagonals, it would be much more difficult to choreograph routines to use the entire floor area, and punish poorer federations who wouldn't be able to immediately replace their old floors/have the space for the new awkward layout

 

[CameliasFingerpaint]

I feel like the ratio of length to width is too large; that narrow rectangle would give us even more 2-dimensional choreography than we get now. Why not just make the square larger? It's not like there isn't enough room, and a 50x50 would yield almost a 71 foot diagonal.

 

[dweiss324]

I'm with Denn. Dancing in a square is dumb, and tumbling into a corner is dumber. I don't think focus would go to tumbling, unless it was more complicated connection passes because there's more room, and more latitude for being slightly off direction. Its not like people are gonna start whipping out triple triples in a rectangular floor. Out of bounds is arbitrary as it is, it's a matter of inches, and often encourages pushing difficulty into dangerous confinements. You can still dance just as well if not better in a rectangle, that is a straw man. You'd probably even use more of the floor relatively and have better dance, because you wouldn't have to make your way to four arbitrary corners.

Any objections being raised would be ironed out in a month, people could comfortably perform their tumbles and improve their composition and presentation

 

[MaryClare]

I’m not particularly attached to floor being a square. However I disagree with making changes to make the sport easier.

Being able to complete your tumbles within a limited space is part of the difficulty. It’s like saying the beam should be wider

 

[dweiss324]

Not really. It's maybe like saying the beam should be longer, but it's more like saying "let's move the bars farther apart now that giants are expected and hip beats are out". Since competitors are taller on average and the difficulty expectations have increased, I don't have a problem with that.

We don't have people vault into a corner. Or imagine having people vault into a circular target, regardless of height of gymnast or vault performed. That would be nonsensical. On the contrary, the out of bounds lines widen the farther away you are from the vault. That's a reasonable measure of accommodating difficulty, safety, and expectation.

In the same way, tumbling into a corner isn't an impressive or intuitive limitation to displaying mastery of tumbling. It's an outdated one, that doesn't reflect the ability or difficulty expectation on current gymnasts, or provide them particularly safe accomodations for those new realities.

Its not to say limitations shouldn't be imposed, but they should match the expectations of the apparatus

 

[Puffin]

Not really. It's maybe like saying the beam should be longer, but it's more like saying "let's move the bars farther apart now that giants are expected and hip beats are out". Since competitors are taller on average and the difficulty expectations have increased, I don't have a problem with that.

We don't have people vault into a corner. Or imagine having people vault into a circular target, regardless of height of gymnast or vault performed. That would be nonsensical. On the contrary, the out of bounds lines widen the farther away you are from the vault. That's a reasonable measure of accommodating difficulty, safety, and expectation.

In the same way, tumbling into a corner isn't an impressive or intuitive limitation to displaying mastery of tumbling. It's an outdated one, that doesn't reflect the ability or difficulty expectation on current gymnasts, or provide them particularly safe accomodations for those new realities.

Its not to say limitations shouldn't be imposed, but they should match the expectations of the apparatus

Well I have seen vault in some pretty odd situations like that old British Competition (Champions Cup?) at the Royal Albert Hall which I think is an almost circular venue and where the vault run included the floor diagonal. It was pretty scary stuff to avoid hitting the stage (they had a small mat in front of it). A lot of today's MAG gymnasts, Simone and Rebecca would probably have landed in the carpark at the back"

 

[Sasha]

I agree that it's more analogous to making the beam longer. Personally, I'd be interested in seeing what sort of new skills and combos we might see on a differently-shaped floor, as I'm sure there are things that people are capable of doing, but not in bounds.

Of the arguments against changing the dimensions, the only one I find convincing is the cost of changing the equipment. I've been told that a floor costs about 70,000 CAD, which I imagine is not a trivial cost for anyone, let alone smaller programs.

 

[Puffin]

We could make the vault bigger, the beam wider and longer and also see new and exciting combinations. But I think whatever size you make the equipment the gymnasts will just add additional elements to fit the space they've got and will still go oob.

A bit like when the US lobbied to have the goals made bigger for the football/soccer World Cup to make it more exciting to US audiences!

 

[Sasha]

Of course people would still go OOB. But they'd go OOB while doing crazier shit.

 

[makam]

Heck, you could even have "grades" of OOB. .1 past the first line, 1.0 if you go past the second line (whatever length that is) and make that 1.0 space a sting mat or different material that will help arrest momentum. Make it a risk to the score to go beyond the boundaries but not to health. I hate that catching your heel wrong on a double pike or mis-timing a rebound can have you nearly tripping off the podium due to the raised nature of the floor space and the way it angles down basically as soon as you get outside the lines at the sides.

(I don't know exactly how the floor is put together but I believe it is usually interlocking sections so it seems like shape changes should be reasonably easy to achieve, just a new carpet would be needed.)

 

[mle]

(I don't know exactly how the floor is put together but I believe it is usually interlocking sections so it seems like shape changes should be reasonably easy to achieve, just a new carpet would be needed.)

The floors I have put together were hard, interlocking rectangular panels with the springs, then several long strips of foam taped or velcroed together, then the carpet.

Although I do agree a larger floor would be great (I'm fine with a bigger square) more panels and foam significantly increases storage as well (I'm thinking about my university where I am pretty sure the meet floor took up a whole room). Just something to think about (not necessarily a big deal for major meets, but could matter for lower levels and colleges)

 

[Denn]

@Sasha: Yep, because of how the floors are made, 25 × 64 can be obtained from most 40 × 40 floors with limited-to-zero cost. The spring and wood is interlocking pieces. The tops are rolls with velcro and/or carpets with hidden seams, etc.

@mle I agree, which is why I proposed something like 25 by 64: same 1600 square foot total.

@makam Totally agree about the decreased safety issues.

@youwannacranson It's not the strides that matter — the 8 extra feet would allow all taller gymnasts to be able to do RO + BHS + something. There are guys who can't do that reliably, even with just 3 steps and a hurdle.

 

[Denn]

People keep missing the point. Corner shape = more out of bounds.

Watch this montage. Most gymnasts didn't go more than 56 feet — but because the end-zone is a corner, they almost got deducted. An end zone would have avoided most of these problems.



And yes, some gymnasts will attempt long combo passes and potentially go out of bounds. But it would be much rarer.