Just wondering, does anyone on your team spit in their grips? You see it a lot on tv. We just use water instead! Seems kind of gross to use your spit.....what do you guys do?

Lol, ya I think that's gross too! We don't do that on our team, but other girls do, I know. Seems like water works good, without the grossness! :D

We do the water bottle instead of spitting also! We had a European elite gymnast at our gym once, and she uses some kind of formula in a bottle - it was kind of sticky - instead of grips and chalk. It was kind of watery, and cloudy mixture, like it had sugar in it.

The point of the spit on the grips is cuz they think it helps make the grips stickier to the bar and they won't slip, or cuz they are away from the water bottle and just need a little bit more wetness on the grips! lol I use water bottle for my grips too. kat, who is the European elite gymnast you're talking about?

we choose water spray bottle over spit too! lol :D we also use some rough fabrix thingy to take off the old chalk on the bar expecially when it gets clumpy, and then spray some water, some chalk, and then some more water spray!

Oksana Chusovitina!! She's competing at the Worlds this year for Germany. http://www.gymchat.com/messageboards/viewtopic.php?p=237#237

cool! eeww on the spitting thing! lol :D

lol it is sugar water!! Dominique Dawes talks about it in an interview on wcsn.com: [quote]For those who watched Jana spray water on the bar prior to her performance may have questioned, why add water and not just more chalk? From my international experience, it is not uncommon for the bars to be slick after competitors that do not use grips. The use of sugar water is common for many international gymnasts. This combination of sugar and water creates a sticky texture for a gymnast that swings bars bare handed or with gause or tape grips. Now, for the gymnasts who wear leather grips, the texture is left slick because when the sugar water dries on the bar, it creates a hardened film. This is why you will she grip wearing gymnasts scrape the bar, re-chalk and spray the bar down with water. Just a little insight on Jana getting a good grip![/quote] the full article is at http://wcsnblogs.com/gymnastics/dominiquedawes/ we spray the bars with water too to make the chalk on the bars a stickier surface than if it's really dry and chalky!

Yeah, we have a spray bottle.

at the Worlds, there was a lot of spitting for vault too! guess the chalk is too dry.