Trampoline Tricks & Flips – The Importance Of Instruction Part 3

Welcome back to Airborne’s ongoing blog about the safety involved in Trampoline Tricks & Flips. If your new to this article, we’ve been covering everything involved in learning how to safely and professionally perform trampoline tricks & flips. Airborne Trampoline Woodbridge’s level 2 certified trampoline coaches have spent years perfecting the progressions involved in trampoline tricks and using their knowledge to safely teach the students how to land safely. These articles have been elaborating on the fundamentals and progressions of trampoline tricks & flips, and how Airborne Trampoline’s Gymnastics Ontario certified trampoline coaches make a big difference when it comes to performing these safely and consistently. Read on for Part 3 of the progressions of trampoline tricks & flips and how Airborne Trampoline instructors teach the proper way.

The hand spot and crash mat technique. They sound a lot more daunting than they actually are. Lets break it down into two sections for discussion. First, we will elaborate on the hand spot technique. Taught by the professionals at Gymnastics Ontario training courses, the hand spot technique involves exactly what you think. The coaches use careful hand placement to ensure that in the event of over rotation, or under rotation, they are able to correct the student and protect them from landing on anything other than the desired position. As a trampoline coach myself, I have always found the hand spot technique to be a little on the extreme side when it comes to coaching. It can be seen as more of a last resort during the training of trampoline flips. The reason behind this opinion is that the hand spot method involves the trampoline instructor actually being on the trampoline with the student during the flip. As beneficial as this can be to prevent the student from landing awkwardly, there are theories that this can also impede the students sense of confidence during a flip. To out it simply, the student can grow accustomed to having the coach with them on the trampoline. Once the coach backs off and allows the jumper to perform a flip on their own, the student may subconsciously feel something is missing causing undue panic and fear. Regardless of which side of the opinion you fall on, the hand spot technique has been used to great success with some students. Going a little further, the hand spot technique, or a variation of, is nearly imperative in the proper teaching of the Back Flip, but we’ll get to that another time.

The preferred method of learning the final progressions of a flip is largely the “crash mat”. The crash mat is a large 7ft by 4ft mat that is nearly a foot thick. It comes assembled with handles and covered with a soft protective material. The main use of the crash mat, believe it or not, is to deplete the students impact when landing, preventing them from continuing their bounce. Many of you probably believed the mat was named and designed for someone who was literally crashing out of a poorly performed flip. True in some case, but not nearly the majority. The mat is specifically designed to dampen any impact, be it an unintentional landing, or a perfect landing that must be controlled. The crash mat is more of a finishing progression aid. Used mainly at the end of the students progress in learning to perform trampoline flips. In extreme cases, Airborne’s bungee trampoline harness, and spotting belt is the required training aid to teach the student flips. Not to mention learning the feared “Back Flip”. More on that next time…

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This has been part 3 of Airborne Trampoline Woodbridge’s Trampoline Tricks & Flips blog. The writer, Steve M. is a Gymnastics Trampoline and N.C.C.P. Certified Coach at Airborne Trampoline Woodbridge.

For more information on Airborne’s Trampoline and Gymnastics Trampoline Programs, contact any Airborne location by jumping over to www.airbornetrampoline.ca

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