Still killllllin it. This is the rig from Cirque Eloize's iD. Just what I needed before going to perform again on the Stand Up 8 wall in Toronto!

Aerialist/acrobat/stuntwoman/dancer/general badass Sarah Moser just put this vid on YouTube. (Check out her page, she is amazing!) I thought for sure it would be a video of someone rolling a cigarette but instead, THIS! German Wheel meets new dimensions!

We interrupt regularly scheduled acrobatic videos to bring you... MAGIC!



Magic, like any other performing art, has endless parallels with acrobatics: endless repetitions of a task until it is flawless in presentation.



After Scotty did it, Guthrie did it. Then he did it in a combo. Now this? Such a monster at only 18, wow.





I had the pleasure of meeting these two at Cirque du Soleil in March. Totally magnetic personalities - they just shine all the time. Lysanne especially radiated incredible energy and attacked any request from the directors with utter abandon and complete emotional freedom. That's the biggest challenge I found while I was there: I couldn't break out of my serious acrobat shell. I really respect the people that can.

I got to see their acro act but I only got to see inklings of their trampoline skills. I finally found this video from ENC and oh my goodness it is more than I could have imagined. I'd keep going but it would just sound like gush gush gush.



Holy crap I need to put this in my act.



A lot of tricking loses its martial arts quality in the pursuit of bigger, spinnier tricks. Danny, however, makes everything FIERCE. Amazingly fierce. Every kick looks like it could take your head off, even if it comes after 720° of spin - that's not easy.

His arms are always moving efficiently to speed up his movements, which takes an extremely long time to develop. Nobody tells you where to put your arms most of the time in tricking, so you need to figure it out through experimentation. You can really see it in him.

Danny is currently performing with Jon Chu's Legion of Extraordinary Dancers on the Glee Live tour.



I feel like I see a lot of cheer tumbling that's like tricking - there are a couple guys who are absolutely out of control and a lot of videos of people that are working really hard to get there but aren't quite yet. Rarely will I sit through a whole one but man I am glad I got to the end of this one. That's some raw stuff.



Uhh, what?

Found here.

Call it what you want: Icarian, Risely, human foot juggling, whatever. It's always amazing to me. These guys keep such high energy through their entire act from the surprise start to the double back series at the end. Brilliantly played fake fall - looks painful!



Well that was a good recovery from th-DOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Found on Gymnasticscoaching.com



We got a lot done in one week! Like I mentioned in the Oli Lemieux post, there's a whole different set of mechanics at play in this apparatus, making it so much more fun and dangerous. I keep thinking about all kinds of other moves that I didn't get the time or the balls to try. I can't wait to work on it again!

If you're on Facebook you can see another angle here!

I just got back from Michigan yesterday and the show went beautifully. The entire week I was sure that it was going to turn out to be this colossal failure but in the end everybody put their best forward, remembered their lines, and most importantly, turned on. There's something magical that happens when you put a performer in front of an audience that you will never, ever find in a rehearsal. I see it happen to me when I step up to take that first bounce and it's 3 feet higher than it ever was in practice. Either way, the show came together in a way that I didn't imagine, and I'm really happy that it did.

One of the huge surprises was Kim's skating lyra routine. She has this spoken part about how she fell out of ice skating, tried everything, and ended up doing aerial. Her act is the absolute personification of that, and the embodiment of a path very like my own. It's so graceful and set to such a beautiful song (one of my favorite Sigur Rós songs); it kicks the show off with a blaze of resplendence that is hard to follow.

So this week is the first time I've ever really spent training on a tramp wall. It's not a very big one, bnd it's been a lot of fun. Really getting down to it and understanding the mechanics and incredible amounts of control necessary for it make me respect Oli Lemieux so much more.



Today I leave New York for the fabulous Midwest to participate in the production of Stand Up Eight. I will be performing trampoline wall as well as various other tricks! The show is Thursday May 13th at the Paw Paw Performing Arts Center, Kalamazoo MI for only $4! Details here.



Happy Cinco de Mayo!

-Ryan

A Yurchenko is a gymnastics vault where one does a round off onto the springboard followed by a back handspring onto the vaulting surface. The rest is magic.



That's a pretty Yurchenko full right there, let me tell you. I love the way she's fully extended and fully square coming down for the landing with her hands down by her sides. Even worse, she did it more than once!

So obviously that's not the hardest Yurchenko-style vault; there are lots of places to sneak more twists into the entry and flight, but seldom do you see people adding an extra flip:



He's an intense looking dude, and that's an EXTREMELY intense looking vault (on a horse, no less!). It doesn't even look like there's time for another flip in there but he manages it, sticks it, and then sports a huge grin beneath his Colonel Sanders beard.

...And then he piked it.

Any other sweet Yurchenko vaults I need to see?

-Ryan

damien walters Pictures, Images and Photos

I feel like maybe if I write about Damien Walters 2010 it will prevent the inevitable rush of "have you seen this video w/ ninja man?" e-mails from aunts and uncles and casual acquaintances who know I do "that flippy stuff". Not to belittle Damien Walters in the slightest because for four years in a row his reels have been consistently insane, innovative, and fun. But what makes his videos always go viral?



It's something like this that really makes me want to try skydiving. I realize that you can't just jump out of a plane and do this; there's the whole progression of getting strapped to your instructor, getting certified, doing loads of jumps (comments on YouTube say Omar has 13,000+ jumps!!!), etc until you can do anything this absurd. But still! Just imagine the kind of freedom he's experiencing! Utter calm at terminal velocity!


Freeflying
is a relatively recent sub discipline of skydiving that focuses on different styles of falling which can be trained and coached in WIND TUNNELS!



Has anyone tried indoor skydiving? Is it expensive? And can I do it in the NYC area?

-Ryan

Research?

Goodness my HTML is rusty and these templates are boring. I'm going to have to do my research. Hopefully it won't be so lame to look at for long.

But here it is. I've always wanted to be able to write about the things I find but I've lacked the motivation to put it in a more proper format.

I must cite The Ministry of Manipulation as a huge inspiration for this. Since I've gotten more interested in juggling and circus arts, their blog has been an invaluable resource in my exposure to manipulation arts. I've always wanted a parallel sort of collection of acrobatic media and it makes sense that I should try to do it.

The goal of this project is of course to share the acrobats and acts that inspire me, but also to attract similarly interested people to bring and discuss the things that I haven't seen. Ultimately, I hope that this can be a constantly growing collection and celebration of human movement and creative spirit.

-Ryan

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