Making pirouettes land on top of the bar

Hi All,

Today I am going to talk a little bit about pirouettes. I have done a lot of these in the past (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3), but pirouettes are something that take time and precision, and lots of times coaches just send up saying things like “just flip your hand and then turn.” Which is where you end up with half pirouettes that don’t finish until around horizontal and have no shapes to speak of. So today I thought I would share a couple more videos of drills I like.

This first video is the newest one from JAOVideos. The video is full of great ideas but I have a few favorites. The straddle up to handstand from the ball half turn falling to back, and anything that turns against a wall (gives a true sense of vertical). If you get your gymnast to learn where vertical is in drills, then when they finally put it on the bar (putting it on the bar is the LAST STEP), then they know what it is supposed to feel like.

Speaking of pirouetting drills against a wall, this is a great one. In order for a pirouette to land in handstand the pirouette has to start before handstand. It’s easy enough to say that, but can often be harder to explain it to gymnasts. Drills like this show rather than tell.

Train hard!