A New Sport

Lately I have been learning a lot about a new sport. It's not a new sport as in never-been-done, it's just a new-to-me sport. It's vaulting. Dear readers, you're probably thinking I have lost it completely due to boring weekends here in peaceful Weimar. I have not. Vaulting is clearly the act of leaping over a 'horse' headfirst in gymnastics, right? You know, the long run, the powerful jump on a springboard, and over the horse with a fancy twist named after some Russian gymnastics coach? "Wow, a Bela Karolyi three quarter twist! And she stuck the landing!" That would make sense, as we are here in the former East Germany and you know all about those Soviets and their love of gymnastics. But no, friends, oh no. Vaulting, popular with upper class German girls (vaulting is to Germany as figure skating is to Massachusetts) is acrobatics on a horse. A moving horse. And all this time I've been hearing my one student talk about going to the world championships in vaulting and I've been thinking she's a gymnast. And she a is. But she's a gymnast on a moving horse. With other people. She's basically a cheerleading stunter on a moving horse. Now I know you'll forgive my ignorance, because I'm willing to bet you didn't know either, did you? And to add insult to injury, I am never sure which competition she's going to, because in German, the word for city and state is the same word, and the word land means countryside, not nation, so when she goes to the World Championships I'm all clear, but regional ones leave me behind in translation dust.

I'm all for embracing the local culture. And certainly I think that Fiona, with East German kindergarten training, is starting to be very physically coordinated. Probably surpassing me at this point, as she can climb like a monkey and is confident of her ability to jump off a swing. But, due to my inherent dislike (ok, intense fear) of large animals with huge chompy teeth, falling on my head and breaking the one spine I have, and Spandex, Fiona is not going to take up vaulting any time soon (ever). But we'll cheer on my student and her sister together at the city-state-country-national-World championships.

If you can get past the weird music and first two minutes of boring introduction, this video of vaulting is mesmerizing. I'm still not sure I understand why someone would want to do such a thing, but you have to admit, it takes talent. And maybe insanity.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=km4fqXsAqmU