Sunday - Team USA Clinic - 8/21, 22/10

Sunday - Team USA Clinic -
More vaulting on Sunday. At 8am, we had an hour follow up Sports Psychology session with Katie Purvelle, doing a couple communication exercises and learning a couple more tools for focusing, concentration, preparation, and all that good stuff! Also going over some of the tools we learned the day before, settling into the ones that we all agreed would really be beneficial to us.

For the next hour, we had a session with Isabelle Bibbler. With Isabelle, we watched our freestyle on the computer and took notes on things that we needed to work on. Things like where we were looking, straight legs, pointed toes, making things exact... Mostly fine details. Then, Isabelle took her notes to the barrel and worked through our freestyle with us. It was very helpful. I am working extra hard on my straight legs and pointed toes after all of the critiqueing that Isabelle gave me!

The team continued to work on the freestyle with Emma Seely after our time with Isabelle. Emma continued the critique of our freestyle - little details, finess, and pin-points. We made a simple change to my flying part, which made it much more steadier. We were also made very clear that we need to have our freestyle set, and stick with it. I think that this was one of the last changes to be made.

After Lunch, we went back to the barrel to prepare for our photo-shoot with Lynne Owen, and Compulsory training with Craig Coburn. Pally was washed and braided and in all of his beautiful clean tack, and we were dressed in our freestyle uniforms with our hair up and makeup on, just like competition. One of the photos that Lynne took will be used for the cover of the Equestrian Vaulting Magazine. Can't wait to see which one!

Finally, after the photo-shoot, we got back into our training clothes, and got back on the horse. We all worked on flight and scissor turns with Craig on the horse. Craig also gave me some helpful tips on making my mount better. By the way, my mount has improved! YAY! Craig told us alot about the scoring of the scissors. A lot is based on the scissor turn - 1/4 turn at the top. Even in a complete handstand, if you aren't turned at the top, you could still get a 5 on you scissors!

TEAM USA BONDING - All of the girls, all of the guys, and the team joined together after the vaulting part of the day to have a group bonding/ sports psychology session with Katie. Katie led us through visualization, focus/ preparation tools, and she had us list our personal, team USA, and the sport of vaulting goals for WEG. It was great to see all of the ideas from ALL of the vaulters. I think that especially after this session, we are ALL going to be working as a WHOLE TEAM at the games. CAN"T WAIT!!!!! :-)

Last part of the day - more vaulting! Blake, Rosey, Mary, Mary, and I did a jumping workout. Following that, we worked lots on mounts, clicks, scissor clicks, 2nd half of flank clicks, and just flat out compulsories! Mary McCormick coached me as I did a runthrough of my compulsories. I learned an important factor of the mill, and a technique that I think is really going to be helping me get into a handstand in my flight more often. Thanks Mary!

HOME - Rode Okie down the road. Fed the horses and said "Good Night!" to a great weekend!