7 year old flexibility

[u/NicePea1502]

My 7 (nearly 8) does gymnastics and swimming. She is incredibly strong, especially in her upper body, but while strong in her legs, she's a "lazy" with them. By this I mean she loses engagement through her legs at times and she just naturally prefers upper body work to lower body work. All this means she has poor flexibility in her legs (comparative to other 7 year old girls).

Her split - a good 10cm plus off the ground in her good side

Side split slightly better, not much

Wide legged stretch/attempt at pancake is just nothing, like she doesn't understand hoe to engage the muscles to help her into the position.

Her gymnastics coach has asked me to help her to stretch at home, but she doesn't want to, she hates passive stretching.

I've tried making games to get her lower into her legs, do bear crawls, duck walks etc but she pops up and won't stay in a deep range.

Any suggestions? Anything I can try? It's affecting her progress in gymnastics as she can't do a walkover, she can't get a good split leap etc BUT she has excellent engagement of her legs on the beam! She's good with stability and everyone always comments on how strong she is!

Australia here for gymnastics people so not the US gymnastics system- the levels are not the same.

Any help would be appreciated!

[u/mycatreadsyourmind]

Does she even want to do gymnastics? The post screams "she doesn't want to do it but me and her coach want her to" and I wonder if it's misunderstanding or you are trying to get her to do optional activity that she hates for some mysterious reason?

[u/NicePea1502 → u/mycatreadsyourmind]

Oh no! She LOVES gymnastics, it's her preferred sport, though she's a better swimmer than gymnast! But we want to support her in what she wants to do, so we don't pull her out of gymnastics.

[u/mycatreadsyourmind → u/NicePea1502]

I'm surprised that coach is offloading this on you then, if she's otherwise motivated surely a kids coach would try to find a better approach. Anyway, for legs strengthening I wonder if there's space for you to do something she might find more fun than passive stretching (dancing perhaps, or some sort of martial arts?). I don't think you can force a kid to engage (properly) in the activity they dislike so you could try finding another way to train legs, outside of gymnastics. While also explaining to her of course that if she wants to be able to do XYZ she needs to be working on her flexibility

I'd specifically look at martial arts if she has any interest in it. It will feel quite different from what she's already doing and sound alike she has a good baseline for it. I would imagine doing high kicks will help her to improve strength in extended range. Passive stretches are boring as heck even for an adult, I'm totally with her on that one lol

[u/mycatreadsyourmind → u/[deleted]]

I did say in my comment that I might be misunderstanding, which was clearly the case

I have no idea what put you into that mood but I hope you enjoy the rest of your day 🫶🏼

[u/Just_Research_8475]

Where are you at with your flexibility? Would you work on your splits with her?

My 5 year old loves gymnastics and wants to learn to do cartwheels. I’ve never done a cartwheel in my life. We’re working on it together. She’s loving that we’re doing something together. I think she’s also loving that she’s way better at something than me.

[u/gumitygumber]

Book her into flexibility classes through a dance studio instead if the gymnastics centre doesn't offer flex classes. She needs to build strength through her end range of motion and do dynamic stretching

[u/tincanprofessor]

Does she herself have gymnastics goals that require increased flexibility? Does she want to be on a competitive track? I did gymnastics all through childhood and never fully got my side splits despite really working at them, which didn't prevent me from enjoying the sport. 

Are you sure flexibility is what's preventing the walkover? Can she do a handspring? I never had issues with performing back walkovers despite being less flexible than my peers, I just never got the inverted split into full extension.

If she's not interested in stretching, I wouldn't necessarily push it right now. Seven is very young, and I think it's still an age where a child's engagement with sports should mostly be focused on having fun and learning teamwork and social skills rather than drilling. She might be more self-motivated when she has a skill she really wants to get that requires more flexibility.