If you've been working on bars for a while, chances are you've heard someone say, "Once you get your kip, everything else starts to come together." They're not wrong. The gymnastics kip is one of the biggest milestones on gymnastics bars. It's often the first skill that allows gymnasts to connect movements together and begin learning more advanced bars skills like cast handstands, clear hips, and giants. The problem is that learning a glide kip can feel frustrating. One day you feel close,...

If your kip feels heavy, stalls underneath the bar, or you can never seem to get your hips high enough, there's a good chance you're making one of the most common kip timing mistakes—dropping your toes too early. As a gymnastics coach, this is one of the corrections I give almost every day. Many gymnasts have enough strength to perform a kip, but they lose all of their momentum because they lower their feet before the skill is ready. The good news is that this is one of the easiest mistakes...

If you've ever thought, "I have the strength, so why can't I get my kip?", the answer may be simpler than you think. As a gymnastics coach, I've watched many athletes who were more than strong enough to do a kip but kept getting stuck. They had the pull-ups, the core strength, and the flexibility—but their kip timing was off. The truth is, a kip is all about timing. You can be incredibly strong, but if the movements don't happen in the right order, the skill becomes much harder than it needs...