Benzilla Blog

[Benzilla]

Trick list as of 04/17/08

SS= strong side incase there's any confusion

2 Adds

Legover----- BSOS
Pickup------- BSOS
Clipper------ BSOS
ATW--------- BSOS
Far legover- BSOS
Far Pickup--- BSOS
Near LO----- BSOS
Near pickup- BSOS
Mirage------ BSOS
Near Mirage--BSOS
Same side mirage/downtime pixie --- BSOS
Pixie--------- SS
Illusion-------BS

3 Adds

Butterfly---------BSOS
Paradox Mirage-BSOS
Osis--------------BSOS
Far Osis----------BSOS
Infinity-----------BSOS
SS ducking clipper --BSOS
Ducking clipper-- BSOS
Pixie ss clipper----SS
Pixie op clipper----SS
Smear -----------SS
Ducking Mirage----BS
Drifter-----BSOS

4 Adds

Pixie Butterfly --- SS
Ducknig Butterfly-BS
Weaving Osis--- BS

5 Adds
Phoenix - SS


might have forgot something...can't think of any more





I've decided to start a footblog to get some tips and advice and hopefully learn some new things.

Let's start out with some backround information first.

My Name is Ben. I live in New York (USA) and am 14 years old. I have been playing footbag for a little over 7 months, but unfortunately those 7 months were very inconsistant and didn't get me that far into the world of footbag.

The moves I am currently able to hit are:

-toe stalls bs
-inside stalls (strong side..weak side feels awkward and unatural)
-outside stalls (strong side)
-clippers (strong side)
-butterfly (strong side)
-mirage (strong side)
-pickups (bs...weak flip )
-atw (bs..flip side is less consistant)

Cosecutive hit record: 197 (left and right equally...mostly inside)
Consecutive Toe Stall record: 55 (left and right)

My consecutive hit record is 197 both left and right feet equally, and would have been higher if a freaking wasp didn't practically fly into my eye. My toe stall record is 26 (right then left then right..)

I have been making footbags for the majority of the time i have been exposed to footbag, which is since april or may. I have made about 80 or so bags in total and will begin to sell them over modified after i get alittle more experience under my belt, and when I am able to take picutres of the bags i make.


So onto todays shred.

I went to the park with a few of my friends, only one of which plays footbag (Eric Weber) and we started to play footbag, i was basically warming up and stretchnig for like 30 mins and then i saw a few freidns from school ride their bikes near us, One of them had bought a bag from me a few days before, and they wanted to see me and Eric footbag.

They were watching for like 10 mins, completely amazed. One of them was asking serious questions like "is there any tournaments for that.." or "where did you learn to make these" "can you do any other tricks..."
which is alot more civilized than the responses i usually get which are like " I CAN"T EVEN MOVE MY FOOT LIKE THAT.." or "YOU HAVE NO LIFE" or the worst " YOU SPENT 30 DOLLARS ON THAT LITTLE BAG OF CRAP!!"

After a while a few more kids rode by and watched the little demo Me and Eric were doing. They too were amazed and started playing circle with us. A minute or 2 later more kids came, all of whom are in my grade, and started watching and playing circle with us. We had like 20 or so kids watching us play footbag, and it was great.

They were so interested or so it seemed...and the whole crowd would go OHH!! and cheer everytime we hit something as simple as a toe stall or a clipper...lol.

we spent about 2 hours doing demos and playing circle. It was pretty funny how they'd cheer when someguy would get 3 hits and cheer the same way when i did a clipper.

They slowly left in groups, kinda like how they came, and me and Eric were stoked at how big of a crowd we got.

Eric wanted to shred some more but my legs were a bit sore and tired and i had to leave anyway because i have to babysit my little cousins.

Today was the best shred sesh i've had in a while due to my knee pains.
I made a topic about it here

Well...gonna go and hopefully finish the bag i started this morning. Night guys.

PS: Sorry for writing so much, had to get it all out of the way.

[Grade Zero]

Writing too much?

Dude, that was flippin' great.

I love reading footblogs of people at my level, cuz I can relate.

congrats on the crowd, the most I've ever got together was eight.

[Benzilla]

Yeah that was a hell of a crowd.

They were practically fighting over who got to use the bags, only brought 3- 2 that i had made and 1 that Brian Denis had made, At the end i had wanted to make a big circle of all 30 kids but they started to leave without warning, i guess they're not as enthusiastic about footbag as i am.

I had a shred sesh today, me and Eric as usual.

I started hitting pixie sets, i just need to work on the set's accuracy and positioning. It keeps sliding downward against my chest not letting me play out of it. I hit a few clippers, came close to a few butterflys, and started schooling toe stalls.

My knee didn't hurt at all today, don't wanna push hard, but i don't wanna slack off and not be able to get 10 consecs again like before. i think that atleast an hour a day should be a good guideline for me to follow for a while.

Eric had found a scale in his house, its supposed to be used to weight food for like weight watchers and stuff but now it'll weigh our footbags. Its in ounces but i can convert the ounces into grams and get a better idea of the weight rather than holding one footbag in one hand and the one im filling at that moment in the other to judge the weight. The bags that I made and play with are 250gs alot heavier than the prefered 50-70g like most players. I can transition myself from a 250g bag to a 50g bag very well so getting used to the weight difference won't be a problem.

Well, im gonna go and start finishing up a bag that i was supposed to have done yesterday but i got distracted by playing super smash brothers with my 2 year old cousin. He just like to see the big flashes and hear the thundering sounds . He gets really excited, and its fun to see his face glow with joy

[monkeybilla]

ya that was an awsome day for me and ben. im eric weber the kid he was shredding with.

[Benzilla]

Yes Eric, they can guess that by having "Eric Weber" written in your singature as your name..


Ah...good ol' Eric..

[Benzilla]

Today was terrible.

Eric Weber and I started biking to the nearest mall (5 miles away) to get to the nearest wal-mart...that we know of..to buy seed bead. Riding on a highway, with no sidewalk, and being tired which somwhat causes you to not be able to bike in a straight line and come dangerously come to oncoming traffic isn't the best thing you can do. It was basically a 30-40 min bike ride. Once we got to the mall we started walking toward the Wal-Mart. We spent like 10 minutes trying to find the seed bead and once we finally did there were only packs with thing wodden stringer thing to make necklaces.. and all the other packs had seed beads that were bigger than pennies so those wouldn't be any good in a footbag. The box with the woden stringer thing was 20 bucks and then like 1.70 more for tax. I had brought only 12 dollars because the website said they had 4 dollar packs .

I was pissed. I jsut wanted to hurry up and get home because there was no point in staring at the box and recount the 12 bucks i had brought. Eric had an idea, that i told him wouldn't work . So he walked out of the Wal-Mart and took his sweatshirt off. He started forming a little box with his sweatshirt and asked me for some cash. I gave him 2 bucks and he put that in the middle of his sweatshirt box. He then took out a footbag he had made, he's getting alot better at making them, and started shredding for cash.

Of course no gave any money but they did look and some did stare.

He finally gave up and then thought of another "brilliant idea." Everytime he would pass a person he'd say "We rode 5 miles and we were 10 dollars short of what we needed to buy" or "All we need is 10 dollars to buy what we biked here to get" hoping that the person would overhear him and just magically fork up 10 bucks.

well we got home and I had to go babysit my cousins so I left Eric. Maybe i'll be able to shred in a bit but im not sure. Its a little chilly out and im kinda tired...

Hopefully i'll find something to do.

[monkeybilla]

lol the one guy was checkin his pockets for cash while i was shredding but he didnt find any. well that sucked that they didnt have it.

[Benzilla]

I had a decent shred in my basement the past 2 days for 40 mins each.

My clippers are getting good. I started freezing the clipper form on my flip side, still a little awkward to play into a flip clipper, I always bang my foot into my support leg .

Pixie sets, or what i hope are pixie sets, are getting better and the only problem i have is that i can't get my foot down fast enough after the dex to hit the footbag again.

gonna stitch a little, hopefully get a bag done for Ken for the Cornell Footbag Jam 2.

[Benzilla]

Last few days i've really improved.

I hit clippers a lot more smoother and hit a few butterflys! It was really sweet, i spent about 5 mins witht the bag on the floor and playing through a butterfly without the bag to get the motion and movements down, and it payed off!

Eric and I have started shredding in the park more, thanks to the great weather this weekend. Eric really wanted to be able to listen to music during a shred sesh but still be out in the park, so we tried to find batteries to fit my CD Player. Eric said they needed 8 "D" size batteries so we went scavanging for them. Crakin open old flashlights and jackin the batteries. We spent a solid 20 minutes gather the batteries. I started to put them in the CD player we i saw that they didn't fit. THEY NEEDED C BATTERIES. We wasted 20 mins and had to go put the batteries back. We then weent looking for C batteries and found 8. We cracked the CD player open and popped them in. The batteries were dead. So we just headed off to the park with the plug that goes into the CD player. We went to the vending machine and Eric somehow squeezed behind it and plugged in the CD player.

We started shredding and it was awsome. The breeze kept us nice and cool. We went shirtless after a few mins and people walking by would stare and call us names or w/e but me or eric would do a few clippers or a butterfly and they'ed be stunned and would shut up. Our friend Charlie, he came with us to the park and skates while we shred, thinks we're kinda gay or w/e but he doesn't understand. Hopefully we can get him into footbag soon, we try like everyday.

After a while we went back to the park at like 6-7 i brought my skate board, and so did Charlie. Charlie and i layed on our bellies atop the boards and Eric would tug us with my bike as we grabbed the back pegs. IT WAS INSANE. We were flying at like 10 mph, but when ur laying down on a skateboard and ur face is inches from being skinned by the pavement it feels like 50. Eric would make sharp turns and skid out with us still on, and sometimes we had to bail because he'd lead us right into a curb or a swing set. This little 4 year old girl was screaming her lungs out thinking we were floating above the ground. After a while I pulled Eric and Chuck and went so much faster, i threw eric into the sand and he went from 10mph to 0 in a split second.

I was great, no one was really hurt, except me..the skateboard ran over my arm when i was on it...i don't know how...and i have a killer headache.

But it was worth it.

G'night modified.

[Benzilla]

A couple basement shreds the past days have been great. Toe stalls getting a lot better and clippers are feeling natural. Butterflies are still like 50/50 but they're getting there.

Hit a MIRAGE for the first time. Its so easy! I can't believe i had waited 7 months ( when i started footbagging) to try a mirage. I guess the videos i saw weren't enough to show me exactly how to do it..w/e i got it now. Feels great too.

I've been trying to get a footbag club going at my highschool. I REALLY want to make one and would stitch everybag that would be used if i needed to. My bro and I had made an appointment witht the principal to talk about it today after school at like 2:30 PM but he had to cancel so he asked if i could come in the morning. So tomorrow morning is my big chance at getting this footbag club going. It'll be pretty simple really..the school won't have to pay a cent..but their monetary support would help..all we need is a teacher to be there for every club meeting and volunteers. I've gotten alot of my friends to join or become interested. Hopefully it'll all go down nice and smooth.

My knee is so sore today. Ran a 2 mile warm up, 3 one mile sprints and a 2 mile cool down at cross country. got a 6:43 mile so im happy...but the pain isn't pleasent. Hopefully i can get a good sesh in before i sleep.

[Benzilla]

Got a good sesh at the park.

Some gay kids riding their bikes said "lets play Hacky-Sack with our shirts off.." to each other. Eric screamed "fuck you!" back at them and saw them turn around and wanted to run. I called him a pussy, , and stood my ground. They didn't come back but w/e..(phew..)

My high school principal is pretty enthusiastic about starting a footbag club. He has to run it through and present it to the school board first but i think with a little demo everything will go smooth. He said at the very least we will be able to demo it for our gym class and play it in gym for a day or so. Not too sure how giving kids like 20 footbags to play with when theres 50+ somthing kids in my class will turn out but w/e.

I gotta find material showing that footbag is an actual sport and not just like a hobby or side game to play and fool around with. Footbag dot org helped alot and flipsider got me some more info. If anyone is reading this could you please post a link to Rules of footbag or Detailed explanations of freestyle and stuff.

Peace

[monkeybilla]

lol that was funny i thought they were gonna come back and kill us.

[Benzilla]

crosscountry season is over. i can finnaly rest my knees...they never hurt playing footbag..only running, and i'll have 3-4+ hours deticated to shredding and stitching each night.

My clippers are more fluid. Butterflies beginning to become natural. Atw are smoother and less rushed. Started ducking, only toe stalls and some clippers...its a start. Mirages getting better. lefty clipper is a pain but i gotta try, even if i am still yet to hit one flip clipper.

gonna go stitch. Peace.

[Asmus]

I am stoked on your progress..

Focus on that flip clipper for a while I know you can do it.

Hopefully I will catch you on the chat soon.

Peace.

[Benzilla]

yeah, thanks Asmus. The flip is annoying. Its like learning the clipper all over again. I fear that it will take me 9 months as it did for my strong clipper. I hope it doesn't But even if...it'll be worth it.

Gonna shred for an hour- hour + 1/2. i'll post after on my progress.

[Benzilla]

Haven't had much time to post and stuff. Getting my computer taken away by my dad for having my brother curse didn't help or make much sense either.

I went to the NYFA symp in NYC today. It was INSANE. It was my first tourney and i was shocked. I've seen tons of shred vids and was left breathless, but after watching Jorden Moir and David Clavens go at in in the flesh i was left pulseless..

When i first got there i went striaght to the registration/sign in table and met Barrett. He was cool and hit me up with a shirt. He was busy so we didn't have so much time to talk, he put so much work into the whole thing. Eric Weber was with me and we were really shy so we just started shredding alone. I saw David Clavens, i was pretty sure it was him but not 100%..turns out my guess was right, he was in a shred circle and kept glancing back at us every once and a while. After like 5 mins he walks over and asks to join our shred circle, or line i should say ( just me and Eric). I was shocked. David Clavens, a world class footbagger was shredding with me. He showed us some really cool tricks, like a double inspinning clipper, and a nemesis. I was so stunned that i started tearing, not crying, but tearing. Idk why but i was. might have been from the anxiety aswell. He had to go start the demo so he said he'd shred again later.

Eric and I were stunned. We started shreddin alittle and after a while Benny Kellman and Jon Schneider came over to shred with us ( can't remember what order they came in but im almost positive they didn't come to us together and i think Benny might have come first.) They were really nice. Benny is a dexing machine and Jon is a dragon slayer. Benny would do these crazy ass dexes, it may seem like nothing to other people or him even but it was intese for me. Jon would pull like 10 swirling dragons ,i think, out of no where. Jon also had this cool trick where he'd clipper set the bag make cotact with the bag on his calf then let it roll down back to the inside of his foot and set it back up. He said he called it a tootsie roll. Jon was really nice and had really creative tricks i'd never seen before. When we were in the circle i didn't feel like so much of a noob at all. I was hitting good strings like butterfly>clipper>mirage>atw>few toes>infinity>drop. Jon high fiving me everyonce and a while after i hit a long string or got some good combos like an infinity made me feel great.

Jon and Benny left after like 20 mins of shredding, but they kept coming back when they'd see us alone, thanks guys if it wasn't for all your help we'd just be there shredding alone and it'd be no different from a basement shred lol.

I saw Jorden Moir and shook his hand. Boguht the kickass New Years jam from him (2005). He was cool. He was busy and stuff so i didn't get a chance to shred with him.

I got interviewed a few times. Once by a guy with a camera, forgot his name. Eric was next to me and he was just standing there. Petrified in his shyness. It was kinda fuunny actually. I was talknig and answering questions and eric was standing there, next to me, watching the birds fly by or staring into the camera. I also got interviewed by a reporter from NYU.

Later on I met Chris. I think his last name is Miller, not sure as i am only guesssing that because of the attending roster having only one Chris on it, sorry if i got your name wrong Chris . Chris taught me alot about my flip clipper. I have really stayed away from it because it frustrated the hell out of me and made me feel like crap. Chris showed me how i needed to spring in and out of my clipper better. He also noticed that my support leg wasn't bending enough, i thought it was but he was right, it wasn't bending nearly enough. He also helped me dig my ankle so i got more crank in. after like 10 mins i hit MY FIRST EVER FLIP CLIPPER . I was stunned. Even after i started getting Chris stayed with me for a good 20 misn afterwards to better help me get the flip clip down. He was extremely insightful and helpful. Sometimes i felt like i was being a dick because he'd be talking to me, for example and i didn't know whether he wanted me to look at him or listen and do what he is saying. Idk if he caught that but i felt alittle awkward at some times. Chris was able to get me to do a flip clipper in 10 mins where i haven't gotten myself to do one in 6-7 months. Thanks alot Chris, I appreciate every second you spent helping me.

I watched some sick 3's, shred 30's and the final circle comp. They were all intense. I left before the routines because it was getting late and i glanced over to my dad and saw him sitting on the bench lookin tired, cold and bored so i didn't want him to stay any longer if he didn't want to so we left. I had to go in 30 mins anyway so it wasn't a big deal.

Btw, everyone loved the bag i made and played with. Dave especially commented on it. Lots of people asked me where i got it and i smiled and said i made it. A lady walked up to me and asked what i was doing. I said that i was playing a footbag and was stalling a footbag on my feet performing tricks and stuff. She had a daughter, 8-10 years old i guess, and asked me wher she could bu one. I told where where the table that was selling world footbag footbags and sandbags was and she walked over there. That made me smile.

Big day huh. im gonna make a bag now. then go sleep. I had a huge cramp in my legs on the subway. I never had a cramp in my legs before at all and it hurt like hell. Must mean i actually shredded hard today. I'll try to shred this hard everyday. I now realize how much i've been slacking. Gonna hopefully have an atleast 2 hour shred tomorrow in the park, or my basement. If i can go to NYC and shred with everyone again it'd be sick. I'll see.

Thanks for anyone that reads this write up. One of my longest posts lol. I had a great time.

[C-Fan]

Glad you had a fun time! Your first tourney is something you never forget.

I had a huge cramp in my legs on the subway. I never had a cramp in my legs before at all and it hurt like hell. Must mean i actually shredded hard today. e.

It might also mean that you need to warm up more methodically, and/or stretch down when you finish.

[Benzilla]

yeah. I think i should have cooled down better. shredding right before i got on the subway wasn't the smarted idea. I'll try to end with slow stalls and drills, and even a short walk i think would help me cool down. Thanks for reading.

[Asmus]

I really enjoyed reading that..
I still remember most of my first tournie in details!

FOOOTBAAAG!

[shredzilla]

Thanks alot Chris, I appreciate every second you spent helping me.

No problem bro

Remember, always drill that flip clipper for like 10-15 minutes at the start of each session. After you start to get comfortable with it, start most of your strings with it. Eventually it'll become as strong as your strong. Your strong clipper form looked great so try to emulate the exact same springing motion with your flip.

It was cool meeting you man. If you ever need any tips, feel free to PM me. Shred hard!

-Chris