Kyle's footblog

[C-Fan]

Looking forward to meeting you tomorrow in:

[Kylescook]

Cant wait Ken. Nice top post.

[Kylescook]

I woke up Friday with a lot of anticipation for the events to come. I had a few cups of coffee and a meeting with the coach then hopped in the car to head to the airport. The flight was okay, I had a window seat so there was something to look at. I've never been to this region of the country before so checking out the mountains and dessert was fun. The only green you see is on golf courses. I thought it was a 2 hr flight but was actually a 3 hour flight, so for the whole last hour I just kept getting more anxious thinking are we there yet? My plane arrived in Vegas 15 minutes ahead of schedule and I was able to beat Lon to the passenger pickup, which was nice since I had forgotten to charge my phone the night before and it was now dead. I wore my Lavers so Lon spotted me right away and introduced himself. We waited a few minutes for Derek and Bear to pick us up from the airport and then headed to Circus Circus to check in. We got all of our bags to my room, had a quick meeting with the coach then headed to the pool for some shred. I played awful and had a hard time warming up. I met Red, Ken, and maybe a few others. After a while the pool was closing and we were all getting hungry. Lon and Derek grabbed their things from the room and headed to Jim and Red's room to drop off their stuff. After some drinks and meetings with the coach we all headed to Shake Shack at New York New York and had burgers and shakes. We had registration and met up with the rest of the people in town. After everyone was sufficiently stuffed Evan and I headed to the airport to pickup Adam Keith. We swooped Adam from the airport and headed back to Circus Circus to drop off his things and meet up with everyone else. We partied in the different hotel rooms having various coach meetings and lots of drinks. It got late we were all a little drunk and decided it was time to head to the room. Ken, Adam, Brian and I went to bed. First night was a major success.

[Kylescook]

After our long first night in Vegas I was the first one awake on Saturday. I had a few cups of coffee waiting for everyone else to rise. We had showers and decided it was time for breakfast. We had a quick meeting with the coach then headed to Peppermill for breakfast. The proportions at this restaurant are exactly as you'd imagine in Vegas. After we all ordered more food than we could eat we headed back to the hotel to grab our stuff and head toward the even site. Brian, Derek, Ken and I were the first to arrive. Ken and Derek sat down for a game of chess while we waited for everyone else to show. The day was filled with lots of sideline shred a little four square and Lon Smith killing the competitions. We had Circle, Request, and Battle competitions. I played pretty bad in circle and went out on Spinning Clipper>Osis for request. I did not participate in battle as I was already pretty beat for the day. Lon, Penske, Evan, and Landes were the top four names in the competition. I was really excited to see Lon and Jim shred since this was my first event meeting them. Lon surprised a lot of people and went off during circle comp. I think he managed to take first in all the events. I met a lot of new people over the weekend, I forgot to mention meeting Jim and Casey Friday shortly after arrival. I met Darryl, Sunny, Greg, and Lizz on Saturday. I met Rippin Rick Reese and got to have a circle with him right away. It was an honor to play with someone so legendary and important to the sport. I haven't watched much of the old school shredders so everything he hit was the first time I'd seen him hit it. He still shreds so hard for being an older player, I think thats the theme of the weekend. I had brought a Red and Yellow spike bag I'd finished a few days earlier and everyone really enjoyed playing with it. Rippin actually requested I make a similar one for him this week. It's really the first time anyone other than Cory and Myself had played with my bags so it felt good to know people enjoyed it. After most of the competitions were over Cale McCoy arrived. I had also never met Cale before today but instantly became friends. Thats another topic of discussion we had over the weekend. How awesome it is that you can take footbaggers from across the country and put them in a room or car together and they will probably get along socially just prefect. After a long day of shred everyone was hungry. We went to a place called Cafe Rio which had large proportions of mexican food. I ordered a Chicken and cheese quesadilla but didnt like it so I gave it away. After food we all headed back to the hotels to get showers but not before a stop at the liquor store for beer and cigarettes. After everyone was at the hotel and ready to go we headed to a spot on the other end of the strip called Gold Spike. Ken calls it Hipster Daycare. The inside is a normal bar but then in the back of the lot are giant games. They had Giant Chess, Giant Beer Pong (red trashcans and soccer ball), ping pong, Giant Jenga, and most importantly FOUR SQUARE. We all continued to drink and play four square at this bar. It was a really fun time. After a while of just us playing a few onlookers became interested and started asking about the rules. By the end of the night we had four or five non footbag players competing in four square with us. It was really fun seeing the new people try to take on Ken, Brian and the other greats of four square. After a lot of fun at Gold Spike we all decided it was about time to head to the hotel. We drank and coached and partied at the hotel for another hour or two and then most of us headed to bed. Day 2 was a success
My memory is a little fuzzy on everything that happened over the weekend but what else did you expect.
Edit: I'm gonna go ahead and throw in my footbag highlights from the weekend here.
Spinning Dragonfly Kick (spinning paradox miraging inside kick)
Stepping SS Whip one side
Dimwalk>Ducking Down>Bubba BS
Tripwalk Flipside
Lon and couple other people complimented my Stepping Set and it was the highlight of my weekend.

[Kylescook]

I interrupt the scheduled Vegas recap to bring you a sick 3 from Swizzle and I's session last night https://instagram.com/p/0jeBE6gUHt/?taken-by=kylescook

[C-Fan]

Such good form. Thanks for sharing!

[Kylescook]

Well. It's been two weeks now since Vegas so my memory is starting to get really fuzzy so this will be short. Sunday was Day 2 of the official event. I woke up before everyone else again so I had some coffee and cigarettes while I waited. Once everyone was up we met with coach and headed to Einsteins Bagels for Breakfast. We were at the shred site all day playing four square and having sideline shred. Many meetings with the coach were had. Everyone had a lot of fun. I shredded quite a bit with Greg and Cale which was great. Cale, Adam, Ken and I went to In-n-Out for lunch. Ken told a really bad joke and Dr. Adam Keith walked right into it. My first time ever eating there. It tasted like an average cheeseburger, not very impressed. After the event headed to Evan's for spaghetti dinner, stopping along the way for beer. Hanging at Evan's house was a good time, we spent most of it on the porch drinking and talking about footbag and nonsense. Lon Smith gave us all words of wisdom on the topic of Hot Peppers. Evan gathered everyone in the kitchen to hand out the super cool trophies he made. Sometime after the awards we decided to head back to circus circus to reconvene before the nights shenanigans. Brian, Ken, Cale, Adam, and I went over to meet Greg and Liz in their room to hang and chill with coach. At around 11pm people were deciding to head to the Flamingo to meet up with Rippin and the others staying there. I was already pretty beat and the rest of our room agreed we would call it early tonight. Cale was one of the only ones with a car so I gave him my room key and we parted ways for the evening. At around 2am Cale made it back to our hotel but did not know the room number. uh oh. After thirty minutes of checking the keycard on all the doors on our floor he finally made it in and climbed into bed for some much needed sleep.

[calemccoy]

Just read that whole thing and love how it just ends with me passing out hahah. Had such a great time with you, can't wait to see you in Oregon and get a footbag to you ::

[Kylescook]

Monday brought another great day. Adam left for the airport while we are all fast asleep. I woke up hours before everyone else but we all expected that, so I had three cups of coffee and some cigarettes while I waited for everyone to wake up. Once everyone woke up we decided we should get some breakfast and coaching in before we had to check out of the room. We headed to the peppermill, which I mentioned we ate at Saturday morning as well, the food was okay. Once we were done we headed to gather our things from the rooms and check out. After checkout we all dropped bags off in cars and headed to the pool for some last minute shreds before heading to the airport. Lon, Greg, Cale and Myself played for a little while at the pool. I hit some cool stuff. cant really remember what. Greg's really fun to shred with. toward the end of the circle Jim dumped a big bucket of icewater on Lon's head while he was watching Greg shred. it was getting to be late afternoon and we all needed to get to the airport so we said our goodbye's and I hopped in with Jim, Lon, and Casey and headed to grab food first. I ran in In and Out and had a burger and fries. We dropped the rental car off, then shuttled to the airport. Once we walked into the airport I realized I had lost my phone. Bummer. I called my mom from Lon's phone and gave her a breakdown of where I had been and where I might have left it. I resigned myself to the fact that I was out 500 bucks and would just have to get a new phone. Lon, Jim and I were all in different gates so we parted ways then. I took a look at my boadring pass, saw the letters C9 and assumed that was my gate. I then heard my name on the intercom, that's not good. I walk up to the desk to figure whats up and they tell me everyone is on board the plane but me. I think how could that be I see tons of people just sitting here and that's when they tell me that C9 is my boarding position not my gate, I'm at B12. Shit! So I had to sprint a half mile through the airport drenched in sweat tugging my suitcase along, but I made it got on the plane and was glad to be on my way home. When I got home and my mom picked me up at the airport she told me she got in touch with In and Out and they had my phone. After dealing with a bunch of nonsense shipping details I was able to get my phone back and am out much less than 500 dollars. All in all the weekend was a great success and I cant wait to start blogging about all the great footbag breakthroughs I've been having since Vegas. (if you are reading this and haven't completed the Feet Measurment Survey for the new Quantum's you are letting me down and I used to look up to you. that can all be restored if you take a moment of your time for 3 quick measurments) https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/V7CQGLT

[Kylescook]

I've played footbag with Cory a couple of times and solo a couple of times since Vegas Jam. I've had a lot of good breakthroughs in my game lately. I've been working on slowing down the catch before and after my Stepping to make them more consistent and controlled. I've also been working on Atomic set. After a session with Cory analyzing what I was doing with my atomics it was decided I was setting them way to high. After slowing down the set and figuring the perfect time to start the dex i was able to hit some atomic sets flipside. something else I found made my atomic tricks better was not focusing as much on the set and just being prepared for the second dex. Once I stopped worrying about whether I was going to get the first dex it made working on the second dex loads easier. I also made a small breakthrough to whirls. I had previously only been trying whirls downtime and mostly on one side due to some knee pain. Well once Cory suggested I try them midtime they got loads easier. I'm sure I hit it bs a couple of time that day. During a session earlier this week I tried nuclear tap or Nuclear ss mirage (not sure which is correct) and after lots of attemps was able to hit it bs. This one isnt nearly as easy as atomic but i'm sure in 3-4 months they will be mid-string. Yesterday was one of the best days of footbag i've had in a while. I got some of it on film and will post it in here later today once i've edited it together. Edit: After watching the footage I realize that I didn't really get all of the stuff I was happy with yesterday. So i'm just gonna try those links and drills again today but better. will get back with a video later next week.

Highlights from the past few weeks:
BS Midtime Whirl
Nuclear Tap BS
Atomsmasher BS
Atomic SS Down BS
Atomic SS Illusion
Atomic SS Osis (Not muted)>Pdx Illusion BS
Atomic Far Osis BS
Diving Clipper>Ripwalk>Repeat
Stepping SS Clipper>Ducking Clipper>Repeat
Diving clipper>Stepping SS Clipper>Ducking Clipper>Stepping SS Clipper>repeat
Ducking Osis>Ducking Down>repeat (footed last contact)
Drifter>SS Clipper>Stepping SS Clip>Repeat to 5-6 drifters
Torque BSOS
Osis>SS Clipper>repeat to 6-8 osis on each side felt much more controlled yesterday

[Nathan8]

Dude. Awesome highlights. Sounds like atomics are going very well for you! And it's cool that you do your whirls mid time now. I see whirling swirl in your near future.

[Kylescook]

Dude. Awesome highlights. Sounds like atomics are going very well for you! And it's cool that you do your whirls mid time now. I see whirling swirl in your near future.

I haven't even begun to start learning swirls but thanks man.

[h0ag3yb3atZ]

nice stuff lately kyle. liking the atomic stuff/drifters especially.

[Kylescook]

Thanks Hogie

[F[uns]tylin' Eclectic]

Wow. I exit the community for 4 weeks and look at your most recent highlights. You've really come a long way.

[Kylescook]

Wow. I exit the community for 4 weeks and look at your most recent highlights. You've really come a long way.

Thanks man. Footbag really has taught me that no matter what, if im dedicated enough I can do anything.

[Add Block]

Good list, would love to see a video.

Nuclear Tap BS

I'm guessing you mean Pdx Tap (Nuclear SS Mirage)? Nuclear Tap would be Nuclear Atomic SS Mirage, like Pdx Warp.

That would be cool, I've never seen Pdx Warping set.

[Kylescook]

Good list, would love to see a video.

Nuclear Tap BS

I'm guessing you mean Pdx Tap (Nuclear SS Mirage)? Nuclear Tap would be Nuclear Atomic SS Mirage, like Pdx Warp.

That would be cool, I've never seen Pdx Warping set.

You are correct, That is what I meant.

[Kylescook]

I've been slacking on actually trying any of the LOTW's so today's footbag session was dedicated to that.

Stuff I hit

Intermediate:
PDX Mirage>Dimwalk BS
Symp Mirage>Near Illusion BS
Far Osis>SS Down BS
Osis>Dyno BS
Tapping Pickup>PLO BS
Flying Clipper>Osis BS
Ducking Legover>Refraction BS
Far Osis>DLO BS

Advanced/Open:
PDX Dragonly Kick>Illusion (ran out of sunlight and only got one side on flim. Will re-film for both)

Still to try before April 15

Intermediate ones I may be able to hit before the due date:
Wrap>Twist (Rev Swirl)
Paradon>Whirl
Ripwalk>Swirl
Drifter>Spinning Clipper
Far Pickup>Fairy SS Mirage

Advanced/Open ones I may be able to hit before the due date:
Torque>Sidewalk
Ducking Pickup>Symp Illusion
Atomsmasher>Pixie Symp Pickup
Double Pickup>SS Symple Swirl
Blur>Pixie Whirl
PS Mirage>Near Muted Eggbeater

[Kylescook]

I've been working on 50 tiltless lately. Trying to get All Basic Legover>All Basic Illusion>All Basic Mirage>All Basic Pickup ive made it 30+ contacts in but haven't completed it yet. I spent a few minutes working on bent tricks the other day. https://instagram.com/p/1WE2IzgUBo/?taken-by=kylescook I really like the way they look and feel probably going to start throwing stepping ss bent into strings.