When ever I see them walk over to their trainers after their event, they seem the size of children. Yes, I know many ARE children (at least teenagers), but on the whole both male and female gymnasts seem quite small, even the adults. I’ve heard the concept of the physical training being so intense on young people that it stunts them; and I’ve also heard that due to body mechanics and strength/leverage complications big or tall people simply can’t devellop enough strength for many events, particularly those performed by male gymnasts (rings for example). Is there an upper-size limit for gymnasts and if so are my two lines of reasoning valid?
You could probably go with a Darwinian theory and say that it’s some sort of natural selection that causes them to be small.
Most of the gymnasts you’ll see (unless you coach high school or college gymnastics) are going to be at or very near the top of their field. Network sports just don’t show a lot of non-champion-level gymnastics. This means that if the “tall/gangly people make mediocre gymnasts at best” theory is true, then you’re not going to be seeing a lot of them at these televised matches.
This is, however, a WAG, even with the best face on it. So take it with granum salis.
jayjay
There are some gymnasts who are taller than most. For example, Svetlana Khorkina, who hold several world champion titles (all around and bars, maybe other events) and is twice an Olympic champion (bars), is, I think, 5’6" to 5’7". Broadcasters always feel inclined to talk about how different her style is because she is so tall, but also about the fact that many skills are more difficult for her because of it. So yes, it’s hard to be a taller gymnast, but not impossible.
Many of the young girls who are training at this level are “stunted” in the sense that they may not go through puberty until after they stop competing.
I was a gymnast for 10 years, regional champion on bars and vault etc and i’m 4ft10 and to be honest, i don’t have a definite answer for you.
But from personal experience, being more compact means easier movement. It means when you hurl yourself at the vault there’s less of you to get in the way, when you’re wobbling on the beam there’s less weight to tip you off and having a centre of gravity closer to the beam helps. When you’re on the bars you’re less likely to thwack your head/arms/legs and while performing sumersaults and tumbling you can complete more rotations. And the lighter you are the easier it is the hurl yourself about. So basically the equipment (for girls) is designed to work best with small, light bodies.
The training can stunt girls’ growth by delaying puberty because of the excessive demands on the body, but i’m not a biologist and can’t take that explanation further.
Fran
Speaking as someone 6’5", I think I would be a very bad gymnast. Sometimes for me, walking upright is hard enough.
IIRC, heavy athletic training (gymnastics, running, weightlifting, etc.) reduces the body fat percentage in females to such a point that menstration stops and/or puberty is delayed.
Puberty is delayed? Really? Anyone have a cite for this? I know that menstruation can be stopped by heavy exercise but I have never heard about puberty being delayed (in men or women) since sex hormones don’t get reduced totally by exercise… do they?
Point one about puberty: For women/girls who compete physically, puberty and growth are delayed, and if they continue to compete as adults, irregular menstruation is quite commen. Gymnastics is just one way this can happen. Body fat is quite important for women, and lowering it makes matters worse as well.
You can find many sites/cites by searching. I have a god-awful connection right now.
Point two about height: Gymnastics is more than the Dominique Moceanu and Shannon Miller stuff popular today. Rythmic gymnastics is very popular outside the USofA, and the athletes are much taller on average. One more popluar girl is 5’11". The taller girls are better suited to handling the ribbons, balls and hoops.
So, while compact size is good for vaulting, floor and the beam, there are other areas where it isn’t so important.
Shannon Miller and Dominique Moceanu both experienced growth spruts when puberty kicked in around 18-19 years of age and it was harder for them to compete. Moceanu went from 4’7" to 5’2" in about 18 months, and Miller went from 5’ to 5’4" in a year or so. Both hit puberty very late (near end of teens).
Stress (physical and mental) and low body fat play roles.
The way I understand it, and I’m no expert, is that the age of menarche is at least partly determined by the proportion of body fat to weight. I know I saw this in the recent discussion about the age of puberty getting younger. Girls are apparently entering puberty earlier because of nutritional abundance…the average child has more body fat now than they did in previous decades/centuries.
jayjay
http://www.timesofindia.com/090300/09hlth1.htm
This article quotes the Journal of Pediatrics. Re: Gynastics and height
http://uwphysicians.org/hbeat/hb980825.html
This article comments about the role of low body fat and the reproductive system in women. It also ties in delayed puberty in gymnastics with low body fat.
OK, we’ve heard from the biologists and the gymnasts. Now for the physicist’s answer: A shorter, more compact person will have a lower moment of inertia, which measures a combination of total mass and the average distance of that mass from the center. For a smaller person, both of these will be smaller. A lower moment of inertia will mean that it takes less torque to start the body rotating in any given manner (such as twirling atop a horse, or somersaulting in midair, or whatnot), and less energy. Ergo, smaller folks have it easier as gymnasts.
Not to mention the physics in the bedroom.
I’ll vouch for the easier body rotating and the lower moment of inertia. God bless my days when I dated a 4’11" 90 pound gymnast.
Yeah, Chornus - “swirling atop horse” - that’s the ticket.
We don’t know for sure why girls are hitting puberty at an earlier average age than before, but increased nutrition seems to be the leading theory. It is pretty clear that poor nutrition or low body fat can delay puberty. If a girl develops an eating disorder at a young age (which is sadly becoming more common) the onset of puberty will usually be delayed. The same is true for girls with low body fat due to frequent and intense exercise.
I saw an episode of “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” a while back that dealt with a man who was sexually involved with a 19-year old gymnast. He was attracted to prepubescent girls, but apparently limited himself to above-age women who merely LOOKED 12.
Looking back at my last post it struck me that, since it comes right after Philster’s post about dating a gymnast, I might seem to be suggesting that anyone who dates a gymnast is secretly a pedophile. That was not my intent, and I hope I didn’t offend anyone who has dated (or wanted to date!) gymnasts.
Lamia, no offense taken.
There a good number of gymnasts who are prepubescent, and some who are just very petite women.
I think we’ve asnwered the OP questions though.
My WAG seconds Chronos, except I’m taking the lever approach rather than torque. Consider how much more strength it would take to hold an iron cross if your arms are each a meter long, as compared to somebody whose arms are only 60cm. Levers multiply force. Taller = longer reach, and generally higher body mass. Which means exponentially more stress on the fulcrum (shoulder).
Indeed y’all have, but I’d just like to add, in support of the “delayed puberty” camp, that every female gymnast I’ve known has had (and if you’ve watched the post-event interviews, you’ll know what I mean) an extremely squeaky voice, much higher-pitched than other women of comparable age. Thanks for your time.
Agreed with Chronos (being the physics geek myself), with a slight caveat…
As stated, the smaller gymnasts will have a much greater advantage in the events that are focused on spinning and tumbling (vault, floor, beam) and in the leverage-based events (rings). In addition, the floor event rewards the smaller person simply because they can execute more tumbles-per-pass in a fixed distance across the mat letting them perform more complex routines than someone taller.
However, there are some events that reward the taller, longer-limbed gymnast such as the parallel bars, high bar, and pommel horse (at least as far as the judges are concerned). These tend to be judged on the gymnast’s grace and long lines, and not so much on the ability to generate angular momentum efficiently. Taller gymnasts tend to get scored higher on these events.
Of course, any top gymnasts will have to also excel as an all-arounder, and the tumbling/strength based events far outnumber the few grace/rythym events, so athletic natural selection in the sport will ultimately favor the more compact gymnast.
Because they can’t play basketball??
I have to go with what the medical folks and physics folks have mentioned. Short body equals shorter leverage points, lower centers of gravity, and having to work in compact spaces in the first place. Plus, unlike many other sports, gymnastics requires exceptional strength against your own body, on an individual level, rather than against other people or objects, and smaller people are generally stronger than bigger people on a pound for pound basis. Someone 100 pounds can do a double back flip with a half twist a lot easier and much more gracefully than a 200 pound person.