6 Things Normal People Don't Understand About Gymnasts.

1. We spit on our grips.
So grips are those things that gymnasts wear on there hands during bars.

Photo Creds: inthecompanyofstrangers

<------those things

So in order to keep the chalk on our grips, we use water...or spit. So anyway, people think that it's weird that we spit on our grips.  I don't know why... I mean, we also use water on them and spit is stickier sooo...

2. We are OBSESSED with leotards

Nobody knows why, but at least in my team, we are OBSESSED with leos.  They are just so fun and colorful and YAHS! Whenever somebody on our team gets a new leo we all get super excited and it's like they're getting married or something.  Everybody crowds around them and tells them how cute they look in in and ask where they got it from.  So yeah...we love leos.

I'm getting better at the whole "drawing" thing

My Leo Collection. I have like...a lot

3.  The bond in our team

So our team has a family-like bond.  Now I only see my team at practice 2-3 times a week...not as much as the elite gymnasts...but still.  We basically see each other every weekend and practice 2 and a half hours together every day.  We laugh with each other.  Cry in front of each other.  Practically know everything about each other. Nobody but the people in the team can understand but basically my team is my second family.

4. DON'T BREAK THE CHALK BLOCKS!!!!

So on bars, we use chalk on our grips to help our grips grip to the bar better so that we don't fall off when we are up on the high bar.  The thing is, it's way easier to load your grips up with chalk when using a block because you can pretty much just rub it over your grips and BOOM...all chalked up.  It is much harder, however, to chalk up your grips with loose chalk because you have to rub it into your grips and it just takes longer.  Anywho, it really sucks when people crush up the chalk blocks because, then theres no more blocks left.  So if we catch somebody crushing up the chalk blocks...we get mad.

This is a chalk block.
(how cool are my zebra grips?!?)

5.  The floor is NOT a trampoline
If you were to actually jump on the floor, you would be surprised as to how un-bouncy it was. The reason everybody thinks that the floor is so bouncy is because when olympic gymnasts do floor the go super high because well...they're olympians.

6. We are super exited to learn our routines!
So one thing you should know is that over the summer we don't have routines, we pretty much just learn new skills and such, so it's really exciting to be able to learn a brand-new routine made specially for you right before the start of competition season.  It's fun to discover what skills you will be competing that season and it is especially exciting to hear your new floor music for the first time ever.  It's just super fun in general to learn new routines!

So yeah, those are some of the things that normal people don't understand about gymnasts/gymnastics. If you want, leave a comment telling me what I should post about next. Vote on my poll!! Ok that's all bye.
-Maggie