The Place to Have Fun and Learn.

   Vault:    Part 1   The Approach
   Vault:    Part 2   Pre-Flight


 book
 A closer look at the important components of the vaulting approach

 Part 1
 Vault: The Approach

Have you ever thought about how many different kinds of vaults there are? An awful lot, especially as the ability level increases. But there are a few basic things they all have in common, and over the next months, we will look closely at three of the most important components of vaulting, starting today with the approach, followed by the pre-flight, and the after-flight in coming weeks.

The Approach

Let's think for a moment. What is the first and most important factor in doing a good vault? If you're thinking that it's the run, you're right on!

All the power for your vault comes from a fast and direct run. I've watched my students attempt vaults with weak runs, and almost certainly, they end up with weak vaults. The more speed you can get out of the sprint down the runway, the more potential power and distance you'll have for your after-flight.

There are many drills you can do to improve your run. The most obvious one is to do sprints, but some others that will strengthen your legs are what I learned as deer runs (illustrated below), marches, and butt-kicks (illustrated below).

 

	As you do these, you want to lift your front knee and push off your back leg and get forward momentum as much as possible. You don't want them to be too high; they should be somewhat low and fairly long. When done correctly, these should look like a deer running.
Marches	These are just short runs lifting your knees as high as possible. Don't travel forward too much on these, and try to do them as quickly as possible.
Butt-kicks	Okay, I don't know what else to call them, but with these, as the name implies, you run while lifting your heels as if you were trying to kick your butt. Like the marches, you don't want to have too much forward velocity, and you want to do the kicks as quickly as you can.

For best results, you should do these down the vault runway, several passes of each.

In addition to the run, the hurdle on to the board is also very important. Keep in mind that you want to keep your hurdle somewhat long and low to the ground. The board is designed to transfer forward momentum to upward momentum; it is not very effective in bouncing already-vertical movement.

Tune in next Month for part two of the vaulting series where we will discuss the pre-flight!

     By for now!

Book

Part 2

Vault: Pre-flight

Last time we took a look at the importance of getting a fast run and a long, low hurdle for vaulting. Today, we're going to move on to the next major phase, the pre-flight.

The stage of the vault is after your feet hit the springboard to the time your hands hit the vaulting horse itself. There are several ways to do the pre-flight, depending on the particular vault you're doing. A few of these are handspring, half-on, and Yurchenko entries. But for our basic purposes, we will only look at handspring and half-on vaults.

Something I forgot to mention last week was the importance of landing with your feet in front of you when you hit the board. This will ensure an upwards transition of energy; otherwise, with all the forward momentum you have created from the run, if you lean forward when you hit the board, you'll smack your face into the vault. Not a pleasant feeling. Trust me.

Now, on to the pre-flight. Here the most important thing to keep in mind is to stay tight. If you haven't already looked at the pencil analogy in the Power Up feature, take a look at that now. The same principle goes for vault. If you stay tight, you'll bounce and fly right into the after-flight.

Handspring

The handspring vault is the compulsory vault for the USA Junior Olympic Levels 5 and 6, and is often used as the Level 7 optionals vault. And while the judging gets more specific and "picky" in the higher levels, the vault is exactly the same.

Besides staying tight, another important element to remember is to produce a strong heel drive to get the flipping motion for the handspring. There are several exercises you can do to strengthen your back and stomach muscles.

"Superman" body tighteners		Lay on the floor on your stomach with your arms in front of you, tight by your ears. You whole body should begin as tight and long as you can make it. Then lift your chest and your legs at the same time and hold it for about 20 seconds.
Heel kicks		This is one where you'll have to lie lengthwise on the vault. Grab the underside of the vault for balance. Let your legs hang off the end. Then using your back and leg muscles, kick your legs up into the air as high as you can. Ideally, they should be above horizontal. Remember to keep your body tight throughout the repetitions.

Once you develop a strong heel drive, it's time to refine it. You'll probably notice that these drills cause your back to arch. With the handspring vault, you don't want to arch at all; the pre-flight should be hollow. But you're still going to need to drive your heels just as hard.

With a spotter watching, try doing dive rolls over the vault. You'll want to have quite a few mats stacked up on the other side of the vault to soften the landing, and it doesn't matter if the stack is high. The point is to drive your heels while staying tight so that you go over the vault.

Once you get that, go ahead and apply all these drills into your handspring vault. Another thing to keep in mind is not to bring your pre-flight too high on to the vault. Like the springboard, the vault is designed to transfer some of the horizontal energy into height.

Half-ons

With half-on approaches, you want to keep just about everything from the handspring the same: the low hurdle, punching with your feet in front, finishing your arm circle to the top, and staying tight throughout the pre-flight. The only difference you make is when you twist.

The important thing to remember is to twist only when you have completed your arm circle to your ears and have begun to start your heel drive. If you start twisting too early, you won't go over the vault straight; instead you will go around the side.

To get a good, tight twist, don't think about it as if you were twisting by pushing your leading shoulder in front. Instead you want to twist by throwing your following shoulder behind you, and using your leading shoulder's arm as the axis around which you turn.

And finally, as soon you hit the horse, don't let you body, especially your shoulders, sag. Stay pushed out, hollow, and tight to get to a good block, especially if you're going for Tsuks.

Next week, we'll discuss the final phase of the vault: the after-flight.

Good luck!

By for now!