Please imagine Bob Costa’s voice reading that. Do you feel appropriately inspired?
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Tonight, inspired by the recent success of the US gymnasts, I headed back to the gym after a four year absence. After quickly making friends with a couple of twelve year olds who followed me around for most of the evening, showing me tricks and moving mats for me (it was like having little minions…only they volunteered!), I gave it a go.
Turns out I’m not doing too badly. In my head, there were a bunch of things I thought I could do, and as it turns out, my head was mostly right. (What follows is a list of things that probably won’t mean much to anyone who hasn’t done too much gymnastics. Let’s just say I can still flip.)
On bars I could still do a kip, uprise, and flyaway. Surprisingly, my hands didn’t even hurt too much. I’m sure tomorrow I’m not going to be able to lift my arms though.
On floor I could still do back tucks, back layouts, and I even attempted a half. A front tuck was no problem, and I could still do standing back tucks off a mat. My tumbling was deemed worthy of an invite to the weekend advanced tumbling class by the owner of the gym.
On beam I could still do nothing. This is not surprising, as senior year of college, I basically cut beam out of my competition. I can still walk on the beam in a fairly confident manner, but that’s pretty much all I can do confidently on the beam.
I didn’t try to do anything on vault because they didn’t have one that went into the pit. Also, I’m not stupid.
I apparently was stupid enough to try a full into the pit. I’m about as good at them as I was six years ago in college. Which is not that good. But I can still make it around in a seemingly reasonable manner.
John came with me to watch, try out a few things, and was also gracious enough to film and take pictures. We worked on his forward and backward rolls down the cheese wedge, (he’s pretty much mastered the forward roll. The backward roll is passable) and he was successfully able to hold a headstand while leaning his shoulders against a mat. John also got his first experience in the foam pit.