To Coach: Steady state training in the gym for juniors

[Guest Valentin]

Hi Coach

After reading you methodology for steady state training i decide to test it out with my boys, however i am not actually 100% that i am doing it right.

This is what i did.

I tested everyone on the following , Tuck planche (on ground), tuck front lever, tuck back lever, and L-sit (on PB).

The results were no surprising..Scores ranged:

Tuck planche (on ground),between 0-11sec...

tuck front lever, 10sec-34sec

tuck back lever, 8sec - 1min and 4sec

L-sit (on PB), 7sec (low legs not ideal at all) - 16sec.

There are 6 boys in the group (in various levels of physical ability, experience and maturity). 5 are 6yrs old (turned late last year) and 1 is 9 (but totaly not the right kid for gymnastics.. parents making him stick with it..anyways).

Given the scores and ability of the kids. i Decided that for the benefit of the majority We will use a mean score of 5sec per set which = to 12 sets in total, and instead of tuck planches they will do frog stands, for those that are capable they will do the more edvanced versions of exericses (like the advanced tuck planche, tuck levers etc..).

They rotate in an order of L-sit -- >Tuck front lever ----> Tuck back lever ---- > Tuck planche. No rest between rotations and a small rest between cycle of rotations. They have been doing this for 2 weeks, and they train twice a week. This is the static portion of their strength conditioning.

Can you advise on what i am doing wrong, and how maybe i can improve it. How do you manager groups of boys like this? How do you apply steady state training with such beginners (The boys also range in time having done gym, Older one has done for like 2 years, middle group has done it for 8months or so..maybe less, other 2 have done it for like 2 months).

I would be very interested to know what methods and how you apply them to group conditioning with young boys (5-6yr olds). At 7 psychologically they start to mature a fair bit more and become a lot more focused i find so they are easier to control/manage..

Any and all advice from all coaches out there welcome and appreciated.

Thanks

[Blairbob]

Hmm, Valentin, I'll be in a similar state you are in about 2 weeks. Our last meet is the first weekend of March and then we will be into our off season mode of focusing on strength, flexibility, basics and swing development. There will probably be some work towards skill development but I'm more concerned about the first 4, especially cleaning up their basics. I've got 3 L4's, 2 are 10, 1 is 8 and I have a soon to be 6 and 7yo in the group as well that come 1-2x per week for 2hrs while the rest go 3hrs, 3x a week. I might get some fresh meat soon as well though I'd like to wait out the season but they are getting beyond what the other rec classes can provide for them and they are good kids.

Recently, we just had a lull in training so I spent a day and a half last week doing some strength and flexibility tests. You can see the general results here: http://drillsandskills.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3157&sid=2c34ef36a33abe7f387cab375bfb2117 . I'm not done with the 2 rec kids as one missed today and I'll put up a chart when they're done and I've already gone over it with their parents on what it was about. It was worth the effort but very trying as they got rambunctious quite often with even some tears and whining when they didn't do so well.

Boy#1 is way stronger in the planche and lever than the others by far and me ( though has very poor shoulder flexion, splits and hip flexor active flex and str and ok sense of balance/coordination ). Boy #2 is close to him in pullups and tied him with dips with a longer L-sit but can't hold his back lever yet as he can just motion through it down to german hang in the L4 ring routine. I'm trying to work advanced tuck with him besides spotting the BL and having him do negatives. Boy #3 isn't even close to it as he can't seem to hold the advanced tuck but he is very weak in his testing overall and it shows in his routines (though he's made big strides from January when I came on). He does his skin the cats with bent arms but for some reason he can hold the BL sort of piked for about 1.5s. I dunno. He is also super flexible for the most part.

Anyways, I will have the tough time teaching them the progressions. It would be a waste of a time to have Boy#1, Muscleman, to work on tuck planche or frogstand while the others do so or tuck lever ( he got to 1m before he got bored in tuck FL ).

I intend to teach them each of the positions and have them work on it when we hit off-season and we will do either 2 cycles of 3 months or 3 of 2 months, which I think would be better and allow us to change the progressions. Muscleman had a tendency to want to bend his arms while holding the tuck planche for duration or bend as he opened up to advanced tuck but know he knows that bent arms are not allowed. Boy #1 will work on advanced tuck for the first cycle while I will have #2 work straight arm frogstand and the rest of the guys work frogstand ( including the rec/preteam kids ). Planche will be easy to train because of equipment but it will get a little more tricky when it comes to the levers.

I'll probably have Muscleman work 1/2 front lay in his FL as he can already do FL but it isn't solid and we want to get him up to that 10-15s. Maybe 1 leg or straddle as well. While we have worked it with the other guys, most barely held it tuck FL or maybe for 3s. I'll have them work tuck FL lever negatives or in the tuck and we'll do other stuff like candle holds on a single rail and body levers.

Typically we do our L sit stuff 1x a week currently after our WU and HS work ( on the wall, presses, kick to HS ). Sometimes we do it before our GPP for conditioning or just as conditioning for the day. I'm still focusing on fixing stuff in their routines, having them hit 2 circles or HS on PB or just tight routines ( floor is fairly atrocious and sometimes takes 2x as long as the other events to get through basics since I'm unhappy with it ).

I'll give you a better idea of what I'm coming up with in 2 weeks after our last meet. I don't really do this stuff with our rec kids as I set up stations for strength training or we do it as a group but these kids are kinder/L1 and ya know how it is...fairly grabasstic and unfocused as new beginners ( just into 1-2months now ).

If they were all rec and very young, I'd have them work the same progressions as they would all be on the same page or unable to do it. My lil guys 5-7 will but the 10yo probably not.

For whatever reason I thought they would all do better on the tuck front lever than bothering to test the back lever which I didn't even try. In retrospect, I'm glad I tested but I don't think I needed to spend as much time trying to test the planche and lever as I already knew where they would be...basically ground zero.

[Guest Valentin]

Hi Blair

Sounds all very similar to what i am doing. Just to point out these boys i am training are competitive boys, who have just started. No rec involved. The practical application to rec kids here would be quite hard give then way classes are run.

Look forward to your next post after 2 weeks. Are you also applying the steady state approach?

[Blairbob]

Ahh, good to hear you have another competition group up. 3 of my boys are L4 who we'll see if they go L5 next year or what. 1 is scoring above 85, the 2nd below 85, and the 3rd just below ( max score is 95.7 ). #1 has the poor shoulder flexibility that should prove challenging to FX but his apparatus is very good. #2 will probably go 5 next year since his circles will hit 5 then but #3 might not have 3 circles by next year but I'd like to go 5 or we could see about him doing well AA/podium wise for a 2nd year of 4. It could go either way. Man, I don't want to deal with straddle flyaway on rings.

Any of those rec kids in this group, I would actually consider pre-team and I'd like to get them into L4 and commited by summer. I'd like to get the 2 lil guys to L4 and I dunno about 2 of the others. Another boy who I put in the rec classes during comp season will probably come back to team after I get him up to speed. I don't know whether the parents could afford it or would want to commit to it but I treat these kids as team kids or they wouldn't be in this group and expect the same from them without the team commitment. All the kids will be put on the team chart and have their progress followed even if my 5 going 6yo could probably care less and make his "predator" sounds or sing his russian lullabies while in HS. Officially, we call it the advanced rec class but in my eyes they are all L3's ( 2ish maybe training to get to L3/4 ).

I'd like to do the steady state cycles for 3 cycles to see where they could be in 6 months besides working a lot of the BtGB material into their strength program and working on their flexibility ( all splits close, active flex, open shoulders ) and mastering HS stuff like walking in HS, press to HS, holding for 10s+ to have nice solid HS pirouettes and what not. 25 weeks puts me in the last week of August which is just about time to switch to working parts. We'll see what the boys do for summer and there will be time missed probably after school gets out, summer trips, camps, etc and we'll have to deal with that as well. After that, we definitely need to be doing routine parts preparing for to combine halves and get them up to competition fit and finish. One of these boys, #1 I hope to compete in Future Stars testing if possible.

A really good idea while I posted this would maybe be blogging it and creating an online log which would probably help me plan besides just making a notebook. I've talked to the boys about filming and setting up a youtube ( like Vadim and GB ) but I need to talk to the gym about it and parents and get approval. I'm a bet skeptical about privacy but we'll see. I can always use Roger's athletes log or something. The gym could probably use a blog, too.