Which is more important?

[HooD]

Style, I can not stand when i see footbaggers trying moves that just look horrible... Even if they were to hit the move, it's nothing special until they make it look good. Both sidedness is important, but if someone's style is just pure ugly, it won't matter if they have everything one sided, or both sided, or 5 add tricks here and there, because it looks bad. Freestyle has to please the eyes.

[Jeremy]

Honza, Ale?, Va?ek: Style, style, style, style, STYYYYYYYYYYYLE!!!!!!

Honza, Ales, Vasek - all look very both sided...

When Ales was in Australia he was working very hard on getting his style on moves to look the same on both sides. - I have to agree that this is important - so is that saying that style is important, or both sidedness? Judging good style is so subjective. For example I think that Ales has one of the best styles in the world - and had an awesome style even pre 2002 worlds. I'm sure many of you agree with me. However Ales was very critical of his own style, and didn't really like it at all.

Honza is very similar - I've always liked his style, but recently read that he didn't like it and has been working really hard to make it better.

So even if you say that style is more important - how do you know if it's good style or not? Do you just base it on your own opinion? Do you base it on other people's reactions?

I think if you hit whirl on one side and you didn't like how it looked, I would work on hitting it on the other side. Basiacally I agree with what Chan said - you should learn moves at the same time - don't work on a move just on one side, do it on both.

[james]

Style is all that matters, period. I'd rather look good tiltless than shred ugly guiltless. I'd rather have guiltess runs than big ugly moves. Of course if you have it all you're in luck (or skill I suppose).

[joplick]

i am the same way that you describe ales and honza. i never play in public because i dont feel that i have the moves i know down well enough (even though i am perfectly capable of keeping at least a 10 contact run with them), i only practice in my room. its not necessarily a style issue, rather, its a perfection issue. i will not move on to 3 add tricks (though i am capable) until i get the 2 adds perfect. so i just drill, drill and drill some more. at first i voted both sidedness but now i think style. i would much rather see someone perform a move really good on one side instead of seeing someone perform that move on both sides sloppily.

have a nice day

[Jeremy]

Ok, I've given this much thought and I've voted for Both Sides!

Basically I think that style is important - and if you have extremely bad style, you should definitely work on it. For example my strong side whirls look so bad that the only time I do a strong side whirl is when I drill it every night, or when someone requests a particular combo.

However assuming that majority of people don't have extremely bad style - and statistics would suggest that they wouldn't I'm sure. Well then style is so subjective. It's very hard to say who has good style and who doesn't. Some people really like Vasek's style. Others prefer Lon Smiths Style etc.

So unless you know exactly how you want your style to look like, and you have realistic style goals, it's very hard to know how you need to improve your style. I really like Allan H's style, but it would be silly of me to try to replicate that - firstly I'd rather have my own style, and secondly he's about a foot taller than my, and I'm sure that makes a difference.

Let's imagine though that a new player comes up - he plays exactly like Allan, except he is very one-sided. What should be his priority? Style or both sides?

As I said before - Style is mainly subjective - sometimes there are extremities that need to be fixed, but usually it comes down to people's own tastes. So you can't really quantify style - you can only rate it on what you personally like.

However Both Sidedness can be quantified. Someone looking at my game would say - he doesn't use his left toe much. They could even work out how much I use it on average and say - he uses his right toe 29% of the time, his right clipper 27% of the time, his left clipper 25% of the time and his left toe only 18% of the time (I made those up by the way). In knowing this, I know that I need to work on my left toe moves and I can do that. -

So while style is definitely very important - it is also very subjective, while both sidedness is not subjective and can be quantified. Thus I voted for both sidedness, simply because it is too hard to know what good style is, and much easier to accept your style and work on both sides.

I don't usually advocate taking the easy way out, but under these circumstances I think that both sidedness is better because you know you're doing something that is helping your game, while working on style might end up leaving you with a style less people like.

However you should really do whatever makes you most happy. I also want to say that in my mind there is a big difference between technique and style. Working on good techniques - that is drilling a move until you can easily hit it and link it - is very important. Drilling a move until it looks prettier is only good if you already know what "prettier" is.

[Guest]

I can't stnad it when I hit a move, but then can't tell whether or not its clean and/or stylish because I have a "birds eye view."

[mouseman]

I think these "don't hit it" things just make your progress slower. Really, almost no one can't hit a trick both sides with clean style when they start hitting it. Just hit it 10 000 times and it'll come cleaner and cleaner. Then remember to practice your other side too, and if someone is saying something 'bout your style, just answer that you are practicing it at the moment.

It's like saying "you need to practice that trick, so don't practice it" :)