Gymnastics for Jayla

Over the summer we enrolled Jayla in gymnastics to see how she liked it. She is always wanting to do cartwheels, head stands, and flips off the couch at home so we thought that she might enjoy getting to do a class. Dance takes a break over the summer so it was the perfect time for a test run. We decided on a 12 week summer tumbling class at Triad in Ankeny, because it was close in location to Jake's gym. However, the setting ended up being a little too recreational for my liking.  The instruction was pretty laid back and not quite as competitive or detailed as I had thought it would be. I wasn’t planning on enrolling Jayla there for the fall semester, but was glad that she got a taste of tumbling.  But, as the summer came to an end and the weeks went by with no gymnastics to go to, Jayla kept asking me when gymnastics class would be starting again! I could tell she was really missing it, and she was showing a lot of interest in it. I had heard of a different gymnastics place in the Ames area from some of the dance center moms – Success Gymnastics. Many moms had great things to say about it, and upon looking into it- it just felt right. They had a few morning time sessions which work really well with our schedule. We decided to sign Jayla up for the fall semester, and after two classes I can tell you that it was a GREAT decision! The instruction at Success is soooo RIGHT ON! There is this feeling of professionalism, age appropriate challenges, and well planned skill progressions. The other place felt more like recreational summer camp. Success feels like detailed training. As it turns out, there is only one other girl in Jayla’s class right now, so they are almost getting individual training! They get a lot of reps and much instruction on how to execute the skills. Jayla literally SMILES the entire one hour class. I can tell she just loves it. :)  Some pictures from her last two classes….

Warm-ups and stretching

Back roll progressions with assistance

On her own

The finish :)

Cartwheels

 

The girls are responsible for putting the mats away themselves. :)

 

 

Beamwork 



Bar intro

Vault intro

They cover a lot of ground during the classes! It will be fun to see if this might end up being Jayla’s ‘thing’. She sure loves it!