(bucket) circle - progression and directions

Hi,

I recently started doing bucket circles.Thank you very much for the advice in my other thread about it (http://gymnasticbodies.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=1438&p=8673), I now use a pillow and everything feels fine; at first I tried with a towel, but pillow is better

I've got two questions:

I'm doing bucket circles on the floor as I don't have a mushroom/pommel horse available. Is it possible to progress to circles on floor from bucket circles on floor, or is this nearly impossible without training circles on mushroom first?

Do gymnasts train circles in both directions? I guess in competition they only do their better side

http://video.google.com/videosearch?hl=en&q=paul+hamm&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=X&oi=video_result_group&resnum=4&ct=title#

If you mean what Paul is doing in this routine, then yes :wink:

If not, well, it looks cool anyway

I've had boys been able to circle on their other side after establishing a decent circle on their main side. No idea if this is common and generally as most circles aren't perfect, it's best to stick to perfecting one side.

kintelary said:

http://video.google.com/videosearch?hl=en&q=paul+hamm&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=X&oi=video_result_group&resnum=4&ct=title#

If you mean what Paul is doing in this routine, then yes :wink:

If not, well, it looks cool anyway

This are helicopters or flairs not ordinary circles, they are much more difficult.

And yes you can learn without a bucket, and on a floor. But then it's all alot harder to learn corectly.

palmcron said:

Do gymnasts train circles in both directions? I guess in competition they only do their better side

It's waste of time and no practical use.

We learn only on one side (on better gymnasts side).

Many years ago Elite gymnasts were required to perform circles both directions in the pommel horse compulsory routines (early 70s?). However as the difficulty of the competitive skills continued to increase exponentially, this requirement was set aside in favor of attempting to perfect the technical aspects of a single direction.

To my knowledge no modern coaches require their athletes to perform reverse circles. As Gregor mentioned, they find it a skill of no value. That being said, during bucket training with beginners I will often require them to begin their workout with reverse circles. In my personal experience, I have found that the awkwardness of the reversal of motion makes them much more aware of the intricacies of their own movement in a way that they could never be when training their normal preferred direction. This often allows them to make great strides in their understanding of technical circle aspects like counter-rotating the hips and driving with the heels.

Yours in Fitness,

Coach Sommer