1974, year of the Curtain

[MetZelRio]

Yeah Moose, things have calmed down a bit since my wife had the new baby, I got a new job, moved half way across the country, and I'm able to devote some more time to footbag again. Tonight's Highlight:

[MetZelRio]

That face when you get a topic reply notification from hi@allankenneth.com

[Add Block]

You look like you just saw a fat dwarf hit a Ripstein

[F[uns]tylin' Eclectic]

He's right, you do

[MetZelRio]

Rev swirl bsos five times
Flip Rev swirl to L,I,M&P separately
Blink BSOS
Revup on strong (my first non-THE)
DIDN'T miss a single rev swirl on strong
Fairy ss leg on strong
Near Sylple swirl, controlled, x2
THE MAJOR UPDATE TO MY GAME:

I have struggled, and injured myself and contemplated, and racked my brain, and ghosted drifter for so long. Today was a MAJOR breakthrough for me and it's no fluke. I've got them. Bsos a bunch today. They aren't mastered, but now, I can actually do them BS. I figured out the final key I had been missing. I've got it. It's no fluke. They feel correct, they are controlled, I was hitting stuff out of them, I believe I could even step out of them. AND, with my new understanding of them. I am 99.99% sure I can do torque now. I have levelled up today my friends.

[isirc10]

I have levelled up today my friends.

That's a great feeling man, it's often the only thing that keeps me kicking when I hit a dead spot in my game. I'm also quietly working on drifters and torques, I'm sure we could borrow some drills from eachother along the way.

[MetZelRio]

Flipside.
Osis.
Me.
Consistent.
Happy.

Level up.

Yeah Iv' let's trade drills. Mine are simple though, like ss clipper>drifter >near legover>Rpt

[isirc10]

That works for me. I just spent the tail end of the long weekend kicking with Kemmer and he helped me with drifters. Right now I'm doing (toe) drifter > pdx mirage rpt and (toe) drifter > pdx illusion. Matt said the far set forces you to really stall the drifter and helps the clipper set. Do you find drifters from clippers easier than from toe?

*Edit: props on flip osis. I remember when I was finally able to hit that in a string - one of my best footbag achievements. Great feeling.

[MetZelRio]

I just dreamt that Brian Sherrill worked for me as a system Technician and Nick Landes was teaching my wife and I how to do PS whirl so we could perform it synchronized.

Speaking of Landes, he taught us to do drifter from toe at NYJ. I've only got it from same toe once and op toe once. Near clipper set hundreds of times.

[Kylescook]

I most often do them from near clipper as well but once I started working on op toe set and treating it like a slightly quicker mirage, toe drifter and toe torque seem just as easy as the clipper version (not that either is easy), anywho i'm with Ivan work on some toe drifters.

[MetZelRio]

Learned flip fairy set today because when I said I DON'T understand flip fairy, Nipp Kolini said, it's just an uptime orbit. Click click, BOOM. Got it. Flip Pixie too apparently. Flip Osis is so on point. Did some BOPs training today. And drifter, they are starting to retreat from me, and I hate that. But, I did get drifter>near leg>same butter BS went for repeat, came close. Also got drifter>ss butter BS. fairy ss mirage BSOS with a nallegaM, so fairy is improving. Butter to Near LIMP BSOS first try felt amazing. That's a lot of contacts for my game at the moment. Gyro clipper> Spinning clipper for the first time. Gyro clipper is so off balance for me. But not spinning. I can do that all day and barely miss one. I used to think spinning clipper was darn near impossible. I'm working on 5 big footbag projects right now. One is released and needs more work (BFF online comp), one is being worked on by some others at the moment (shhhhhhh). My next one I've had I the works for about a year and it's probably going to come out in the fall and be something that will hopefully go on forever with out without me. I have so much to contribute to this sport, to further this community. I don't qualify for BAP, but I'd still like to contribute as much as I can and serve this community.

[Add Block]

Love the current projects, but really looking forward a specific one that I believe you're doing. You once said what it was, so I'm hoping you've not given up

[Sporatical_Distractions]

Flip Osis is so on point.

datswussup!

[MetZelRio]

Afghan Belgian Cantonese Danish English French Greek Hungarian Icelandic Jamaican Kenyan Lebanese Okay that's enough.

I'm so inconsistent at footbag, one trick is pretty good for me. Hitting one out of about 20 attempts is normal. So if you see me hit a link or a BSOS. I'm having a spectacular day.

Here's what I DON'T understand. How you guys can do strings of tricks like, 30 and I struggle to hit one 3 add.

I almost quit today because yeah, I can hit stuff, but not big stuff. Yeah, I can do some links occasionally, but drills? Yeah, no. I can do a string of tiltless, but barely in control.

I don't know. I feel embarrassed to play footbag sometimes. Not because it's footbag, but because I should be better than this.

Drifter and Osis are gone. They're not even difficult tricks. 3 adds. I've struggled with them forever. I think I've finally figured them out. And they retreat. I hate it. It's not even about drifter and Osis. It's about being consistent. If footbag was about hitting one trick every once in a while, I'd be okay. I gotta go.

[isirc10]

I almost quit today because yeah, I can hit stuff, but not big stuff. Yeah, I can do some links occasionally, but drills? Yeah, no. I can do a string of tiltless, but barely in control.

I don't know. I feel embarrassed to play footbag sometimes. Not because it's footbag, but because I should be better than this.

Chin up. It's times like these where it's important to take a step back and look at the way you play and train. I'm no expert, but over my 3.5 years playing, I've had the opportunity to play with some amazing players and teachers who helped me think critically about my game. I've noticed that hitting a wall (in footbag progress, not literally introducing your fist to some masonry) is often the best thing that can happen to your game. Either that, or an injury. When you hit that wall, it's time to look back and appreciate all the things you have accomplished as a player (from the point of view of a muggle) and pinpoint your shortcomings.

You seem to have done the second part above. Start with the "barely in control" part. Go back and hit all of your basic two add drills with the most solid delays you have ever hit, and do it until you feel like you can hit any trick out of them. I'm talking links with mirages, legovers, ect. If something feels unsure or you find yourself unbalanced, don't count it as a completed link - go back and break it down to the components and see where the improvement needs to occur. Set, plant, dex, hop, stall, upper body posture, breathing? I'm sure you know that all of them affect how you hit a trick. Go for distance, not intensity at this point and try to push repeating 2add drills to higher contacts each session. The reason we go back to the 2adds is that it is much easier to figure out what you are doing wrong at the base of the pyramid, instead of having to dig through layers of uptime sets, spins, ducks, Xdex... that crap.

It's easy to think that you are "above" a certain trick or link, that you should be better than you are. Every footbagger ever has had these same thoughts, and it's what drives us to be better. However, they need to be channeled in a positive direction, which takes some thought and resilience. On a side note, I strongly suggest talking to Matt Kemmer, and watching his videos. Since I've returned from my injury, I've subscribed to his approach (stall it like you mean it) and it has paid off ten fold. I know our situation may not be the same (factoring in age, experience, outside commitments, ect) but I know I've definitely felt like I was going nowhere with footbag even though I was hitting impressive single tricks. Every time I had to go back and drill basics. "Baby tricks" as Nathan Pipenberg would call them. Think of it as a full rebuild of your game, a second chance to improve you basic skill set and form. It isn't nearly as glamorous as hitting blurriest>blurriest, but going tiltless for 50 contacts is way more impressive and helps every aspect of your game.

So yeah, I'm sorry if you know all of this and this is just me rambling on in your blog, but I really believe you can be a good player.

TLDR; Play for yourself and don't be afraid to take a few steps back. Remember that you are a god to anyone who thinks this is called hackysack. Stall the bag longer. Most importantly, don't give up. Take joy from the fact that you are healthy and can have fun kicking around a fabric bag with metal beads, according to some convoluted set of rules based on imaginary planes and made up points.

[Add Block]

Every foundation trick/element in footbag comes and goes, on repeat at least 20 times.

I've had 15 Drifter 'revelations' where I thought 'this is it, this is how you do Drifter' and none of the 15 worked the day after. This happens to every elementary trick and every set.

There's some things to focus on while you're doing a trick, like keeping flexed calves when DSOing, that will make the trick 10x easier. But still, I don't know if this works for everyone, but the only way I could learn Pixie set and Drifters and stuff was to just do it, keep doing it for a year and only then I'm consistent.

It also helps to know what you should focus on. But if you post a video, we can tell you. A player can never really tell what's wrong with his tricks, I struggled with flip Pixies until I asked Honza, and then I fixed it in a week.

Also, don't feel that you need to push for Guiltless. This is why this sport will never be popular, because people are too obsesed with ADDs, even when they say they're not. It's fine to do Tiltless, with an occasional 3 ADD that you like, just do tricks you like doing.

[MetZelRio]

What I'm about to say probably doesn't help what I experienced today... But I just saw "socks" by David Clavens "shoes optional" for the first time.

I can't believe it. And I struggle hard with my shoes on.

Socks: https://youtu.be/LiKc0p8CfuE

[Add Block]

Barefeet is much much easier than anything with shoes on, at least Toe stuff. That's why barefeet doesn't count, or at least I hope it doesn't.

I've hit stuff in socks that would make you nauseous, there are no limits. With shoes, there's a limit on the speed of DEXing, as the added weight greatly increases the centripetal force on your legs, and hurts your knees if you DEX too fast.
If I hit in shoes any of the stuff I've hit barefeet, I'd dislocate my knee.

[MetZelRio]

Thank you Kevin, Ivan and Vojta and David. Y'all are string masters. Don't take that for granted.

[MetZelRio]

OKAY....

How does this figure?
Best Shred day of my life today.
whatever.