Quick Tip – Flex on beam

Hi All,

Today I wanted to share a quick tip of things that I use in my beam rotation almost every day. I don’t ever feel that we get enough flexibility done in warm-up so much of the time I will add flex stations in on beam for when kids are waiting for their turns or as side stations. But these two exercises are ones that I use all the time.

The first one is bridges on beam. I don’t think people do these nearly often enough. Most of the time coaches have gymnasts stretch their bridges with hands shoulder width apart. Well what happens when all of a sudden their hands have to be next to each other? They don’t have the same amount of flexibility. It has to be taught (and stretched) earlier than when we start walkover-ing on the beam. If you want to take some of the pressure off of their backs you can even have them do them with their feet on an elevated mat at the end of the beam.

This second one is needle kicks. I can’t emphasize the importance of needle kicks enough. Especially if you are looking at ever round off-ing, aerial-ing or front aerial-ing these are going to be especially important.