Expanding High School Gymnastics

I just received word on one of the message boards I frequent that Virginia has lost yet another high school gymnastics team. Northern Virginia is now down from eight to seven teams total. I’m hoping that I receive good feeedback from the letter I sent to the athletic director in my hometown, so I can hopefully continue to spread the word for the need of high school gym teams.

I was reading the rules for high school gymnastics meets on the Virginia High School League website and noticed something much different on it than the other sports: sportsmanship. There was an entire section devoted to sportsmanship, not only among the athletes and the coaches, but the fans as well. It was refreshing to see a sport promote such a positive atmosphere; it painted a very different picture than sports often do. Having a sport such as gymnastics in your high school promotes a positve morale for all the athletes and fans, and can carry over into the rest of the dynamics of the school as well.

There are often many myths and misconceptions about the sport of gymnastics that might stray people away from it, so I wanted to clear a few of them up:

• “Gymnastics makes you short”- Many people are under the impression that gymnastics completely stunts your growth, and that only shorter people can be gymnasts. I think Bela Karolyi (National Team Coordinator and one time coach of gymnastics legends Nadia Comaneci and Mary Lou Retton) said it best when he said that gymnastics makes you shorter just as much as basketball makes you taller. People tend to lean towards sports that are more accomodating for their body size. Of course, if you are taller, you are more influenced to play sports such as basketball or volleyball. Also, there is nothing that says that taller people cannot do gymnastics. A big portion of gymnastics is about body awareness, and learning what your body needs to do to complete certain skills. Taller gymnasts have to learn skills differently than shorter gymnasts do, but they are definitely able to do them.

• “Gymnastics is too dangerous”- Just as with any other sport, there is always a risk of injury. And yes, the risk is heightened in gymnastics when taking into account the vast number of twists, flips, and turns that one has to make in a single routine. However, injury prevention is started with the very basics. One of the first things a young gymnast learns how to do is fall correctly. They are taught how to be aware of what their body is doing during every skill, and how to position themselves to avoid injury. Because these types of skills are taught so early on in the training process, they carry on throughout further training when the gymnast is attempting even harder skills. Gyms are also required to have  a certain number and level of safety certified mats set around the training area. Some gyms even have foam pits that gymnasts can practice new skills into, therefore eliminating risk of injury almost all together. While gymnastics is dangerous, every prevention possible is taken to ensure safety.

• “Gymnastics is only an elite sport”- Many people are under the impression that gymnastics is only an elite sport (the level of gymnastics you see on TV during the Olympics), but that is far from the truth, and also is the main idea and purpose of my blog. There are so many levels of gymnastics, and there is something out there for everyone. While gymnastics clubs train gymnasts to become elite gymnasts, there are many other levels as well. Clubs are starting to carry adult gymnastics, where adults that have on previous training in the sport can try it out and compete against each other. There is also high school gymnastics, which also carries all different levels of the sport. High schools in the same area compete against each other and eventually can go on to statewide and even nationwide meets. College gymnastics is more advanced, and works much like any other college sport. 96 colleges and universities around the nation carry NCAA gymnastics, and the number is still growing.

The sport of gymnastics can be traced back about 2000 years, when the ancient Greek soldiers used it as a training technique. The first event actually introduced was the pommel horse, which they used to practice both strength and endurance. By the first Olympics in 1896, men’s gymnastics had gained enough popularity and attraction to be admitted into the Games. Since the sport was still in its early stages, the main six events that the men have today (high bar, parallel bars, pommel horse, rings, vault, and still rings) were not set. Instead, events such as rope climb, the swinging rings, and a group floor routine existed. The introduction of women’s gymnastics in the Olympics came in 1928 but only included the floor exercise. It wasn’t until 1954 that the six men’s events and four women’s events (floor, vault, beam, uneven bars) that you see today were set.

During this all, gymnastics was admitted into the school systems in 1830. It began much like Olympic gymnastics began primitively, using just the floor exercise. School systems used it as a way to keep its students in shape, much like Physical Education classes in elementary schools today. The focus was first on flexibility, and strength was viewed as secondary.

The lacking number of high school gymnastics programs is not only a problem in Virginia, but around the rest of the United States as well. I was researching the number of programs there were total and found that only 22 states actually had high school gymnastics: Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Lousiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, New York, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Texas, Virginia, Washington, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. While each program is run differently, the main issue for the decline in programs remained the same: liability. An extreme lack in qualified coaches has kept many of these programs from growing or even starting in some states to begin with. While the interest has to be there among the athletes, there is an even more desperate need for willing coaches as well. That is the only way that high school gymnastics will have a chance to flourish in other states.

I ran across an article today posted about two years ago on how club and high school gymnastics often do not mesh. The article argued that many northern high school gymnastics teams were considering dropping because of the increased number of club gymnastics teams in the area. Club gymnastics teams provide a better and faster track to elite level, and is more physically demanding. While club gymnastics will, in fact, almost always get you farther in the long run, not everyone starts gymnastics with the dream of going to the Olympics.

Many gymnasts, like myself, do the sport merely because they love it and because they want to improve upon the skills they have already learned. Beyond that, it is also a good social outlet to have with people who have very similar interests as yourself. High school gymnastics is less demanding and less time consuming, therefore allowing for more school involvement, and also more free time outside of school related activities in general. These athletes should have the choice as to whether they want to do club or high school gymnastics, or even attempt both if they’d like.  Cutting club programs and limiting gymnasts’ options only deters them from the sport in the long run.

Hey everyone! I’m Katy Lovin, a rising senior at James Madison University. I’m a Public Relations major with a minor in Technical and Scientific Communication. I’m from Chester, Virginia (a town just south of Richmond) but from the joys of being an Army Brat I’ve also lived in North Carolina, Germany, and South Carolina, where I was born.

The topic I chose for my Advocacy Project was the expansion, or lack thereof, of high school gymnastics teams in the state of Virginia. I grew up as a gymnast since age 5 and never wanted to do another sport. My days always consisted of going to school, getting picked up and going straight to gymnastics practice, going home and doing my homework, then going to bed. Repeat. I wouldn’t have had it any other way either. Just like any other sport, the higher the level that you are, the more practice time you need. By the time I completed my freshman year of high school, I was practicing twice as much as when I began the sport, and my high school extra curricular activities lacked because of it. I had no time to join school clubs or any other activities besides gymnastics. I knew that if I wanted to start participating in school activities, I would have to quit the club gymnastics program I was in. The only problem was that my high school, nor any of the surrounding high schools in the area, carried a high school gymnastics program. This forced me to quit the sport that I had grown up my entire life doing.

This brought my attention to the lack of gymnastics programs available to high school students in the Virginia area. Only 80 schools in the entire state of Virginia competed gymnastics in the 2007-2008 season. To put that number in perspective, my county of Chesterfield County as 12 high schools alone, none of which have gymnastics programs. High schools should consider adapting to the changes of interest as time goes on. The sport of gymnastics has gained increased popularity at an exponential rate over the past four years especially. The past two Olympic Champions (Carly Patterson and Nastia Liukin) as well as Shawn Johnson (dubbed as America’s sweetheart during the past Olympic Games) have all been from the United States, thus drawing much attention from younger gymnasts that will inevitably want to continue their training when they hit high school age.

I hope to use this blog as a way to inform others of the need for more high school gymnastics programs, and the positive outcomes that they can, and will, bring to future athletes.