It's the Last Thing the Judges See!

Whatever happens, you absolutely have to stick the landing, because that's the last thing the judges will see.

Explanation: I heard this line over and over and over again during the last Olympics. As a result, I use it as often as I can, sometimes in situations that don't quite rival Olympic gymnastic competition.

Anyway, with that said and my newfound obsession with gymnastic rings, the following clip of Andreas Aguilar at is pretty much perfect:



I own gymnastic rings primarily for two fundamental exercises: pull-ups and dips. As you can see in the clip, there are several other skills possible on the rings that require much much more strength. One such exercise is called the "muscle-up". The muscle-up starts at the bottom position of a pull-up and finishes at the top position of a dip. The transition from the top of the pull-up to the bottom of the dip is without a doubt the hardest part. In the very beginning of the above clip, Aguilar does a muscle-up so smoothly, it's absolutely superhuman. This guy has muscles on his muscles. Unreal.

E.R. Here I Come!

Doing dips on gymnastic rings is kind of like doing lunges on ice.

Explanation: My gymnastic rings are up in my garage! When searching the web for "gymnastic rings exercise", the first thing I found was a paper on "Leg Dislocation related to a gymnastic ring exercise". So, suddenly I trust my engineering even less! Anyway, it held through one night, which is good, since my car is under the giant 2x6 I have mounted to the ceiling.

As for dips on the rings, I always seem to end up looking like this:


In other words, don't expect this from me anytime soon: