Kickin it Old Skool. What was that??

[Strix]

I have to post this video. Classic footbag.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2URvZFuxBls[/youtube]

Carol's whole routine is sick, but at 2:49 and 2:54 she does a move that is pretty rad. What do you call it?

If you have not already, put this "Carol Wedemeyer footbag" in the youtube search box. Watch her vids, great stuff!!!

Now I know Carol Wedemeyer is well known in footbag. But I think Carol is always worth a revisit!

[Asmus]

It's a rake.

It's still fairly common.

[Strix]

Thanks for the feedback.

I like the way that flows as a move.

[Outsider]

but at 2:49 and 2:54 she does a move that is pretty rad. What do you call it?

It's a rake.
It's still fairly common.

Just a little bit more precisely, it is a Cross-Body Rake (you can do a not-cross-body rake --- that move is somewhat less common that a cross-body rake [perhaps because its not guiltless like the cross-body rake is... Cross-Body Rake is typically just called "Rake" for short because one hardly ever sees the real not-cross-body rake performed anyway] and the not-cross-body rake is really very similar to a Pick-Up except that its more of a back-to-front carrying-stall movement rather than a side-to-side dex-and-then-stall movement).

And while the cross-body rake may indeed be a fairly common move still, Carol Wedemeyer's cross-body rakes were always uncommonly good. Notice that form -- unlike most cross-body rakes one sees today, Carol really reaches back behind her (and across-the-body) to scoop the bag up, and continues with a nice follow-through to really scoop the bag forward and up. THAT is how it should be done! The audience knows it too -- she gets some applause and an enthusiastic "Oh Yeah!" from the crowd for that first cross-body rake, and the second one just a couple seconds later is set right to a flying clipper --- that is, a big follow-through scooping the bag up high into the air for a jumping kick.

Her last trick is also a cross-body rake, also with nice form (of course) and a big follow-through that puts the bag up above her head for a well-planned hand-catch to finish her show.

Sam Conlon, the first performer on this video, is also pretty spectacular -- a dropless routine -- Sam's "Super Freak" is a classic (Rick James, bitch!). Check-out how good her Flyers are and flowing so smooth into and out from a sole stall (that deservedly gets a big "Yeah!" from the crowd too). And I just love that osis to dragonfly to flying clipper combo --- flyers are really hard to do so well, to hit them under control so they don't go flying off in the wrong direction, and to do them smooth and big, making them look good, and doing them consecutively... all that is harder than it looks, imo.

I thank you for posting this video. I don't think I had ever seen these routines before. I remember where I was when I HEARD about the results from Worlds 1998 (sadly, I wasn't actually there). I was talking on the telephone to Brenda Solonoski, registering over the phone for Funtastiks 1998 (15 years ago this coming weekend...) Taping was becoming pretty common already, but taping wasn't really digital yet, and videos on-line were really rare, so video footage of these footbag legends is truly a rare treasure.

Interesting story about Funtastiks that year --- Carol Wedemeyer was there too, as well as Peter Irish, Greg Nelson, and Eric Wulff. Carol had just won the Women's division at Worlds a few weeks earlier, and Eric had just won the Open division. Carol was pretty much the only woman at Funtastiks that summer who was Pro-caliber, so there was no "Womens' Freestyle" division at Funtastiks, so she competed in the Open division against Greg, Peter, and Eric. Greg Nelson did a dropless routine. Then Peter Irish did a dropless routine, then Carol did a dropless routine, then Eric Wulff did a one-drop routine --- the 1998 Womens' World Champion winds-up winning the whole thing, beating the Mens' World Champion. It was a really amazing series of performances. I wish I could watch THAT on video, but, to the best of our knowledge, NOBODY taped it.

(there were at least two prolific tapers in attendance that year, Eli Piltz and Dank Frank Gutowski, but they were both JUDGES, thus they were not rolling their cameras )

Thanks again for posting this video --- I reckon that we could all learn a little about style from watching these two great performances.

[Strix]

Outsider, Thank you for the history and the clarification on the X-body rake. And yes we can learn allot from the style and grace of these two ladies. But the style back then was different. I think speed through the 2k era became more important. Stepping back and watching this classic footage is nice.

I absolutely agree with watching Carol and Sam's performances, gorgeous. Those Jesters er Flying Clippers are hard. First trick after simple stalls that I ever learned. To pull consecutive flyers with that control is awesome.

Im glad you enjoyed the video as much as I did. If you check out footbaghof's youtube channel you will get to see some other very nice footbag videos from the 90's.

[Asmus]

Can somebody show me a non-crossbody rake? It makes no sense to me.

[Outsider]

Can somebody show me a non-crossbody rake? It makes no sense to me.

Here's another video of Carol, a short little "commercial" for Converse shoes... I don't think this was a real television add --- I think this was a little promotional video that was perhaps trying to get the attention of Converse... I'm not sure.

Anyway, at just about 16/17 seconds in, Carol does a not-cross-body rake. Its not the best example of this trick. Carol's CROSS-BODY rakes were uncommonly good, and as for the NOT-cross-body rakes, well, perhaps they were more ordinary. Keep in mind, she's not playing in Lavers here OR even in shorts...

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

As I said, a rake can be very very similar to a pick-up --- the distinction is subtle. I think of it this way: a pick-up is like the reverse of a leg-over, and thus the bag is always in front of you, and your leg moves around the bag from side-to-side. A rake, on the other hand, is sort of like the reverse of a Pendulum, so the bag starts out somewhat BEHIND you, and its not so much a full dexterity around the bag, but rather a catch-and-scoop-forward. So, its a back-to-front movement instead of a side-to-side movement.

Another way of putting it --- if Cross-Body Rake is the reverse of a Pendulous Set, then regular Rake is the reverse of a Pendulum. (I'm not saying that I INVENTED it, but I arrived at the idea of a Pendulous set independantly right around the time that Evan Lovely really introduced it as his invention --- I was watching some shred video in reverse and Ryan Mulroney's diving cross-body rake became a pendulous-set duck... I thought that was good new idea, but my Pendulous-Sets were terrible, and Evan's were great...) (they say that LegBeater was invented in a similar fashion, but watching shred video and seeing Blur in reverse...)

Anyway, I don't personally recall seeing Carol doing so many regular not-cross-body rakes --- like I've said over and over, it was her Cross-Body Rakes that really stood-out (and her Drifter-Cross-Body Rake, a.k.a. Swerve), but Sam Conlon used them fairly regularly, and you can see she does a nice one in her routine at just about 7:06 minutes in this video =

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIuWPOrw ... -4FBYdTpGk

Its a nice little classic Sam Conlon combo -- a sort of little pendulum to a sole-stall to a rake... too bad the video quality is a little poor and somebody cuts in front of the camera just in the middle -- probably a bike-rider. Just about 10 seconds later she does a cross-body rake too, though perhaps its really more of a "gyro-not-cross-body" rake... Where I'd really like to look for a good example of Sam's Rake is on Tricks of The Trade Two --- I'm pretty sure her "Routine" on that video featured a rake or two, but I couldn't find any video of TotT2 on youtube.

Peter Irish had a couple of nice not-cross-body rakes in his arsenal long ago --- I think he used to hit something like a spinning not-cross-body rake... I think you might see something like that somewhere on Raw Shred, but I'm not going to go through all that footage to find it now.

Perhaps I should just finally take that trip to Denmark that I've daydreamed about and show you in person, but there are so many places to go and so little time....

[Alex Dworetzky]

i think i call these "not-cross-body rakes" same side rakes, but cant be bothered to really figure out what you're talking about. which begs the question, is this worth posting? like what i am saying, is it worth posting? i cant be sure at the moment