The art of swingthroughs! Tricking, kicks, martial arts!

Hey everyone,

This week were going to talk about an advanced style of tricking that most people want to attain at some point in the tricking career. This week were going to be discussing swingthroughs. Swingthroughs are an important part in tricking because it enables you to link moves with put your foot on the ground. It's very difficult to do and you have to make sure your flips, and tricks are up to par before trying swingthroughs or you could hurt your ankles and knees pretty badly.

Some of the best ways to start swingthroughs are to attempt them from scoots or t/d raise because they are moves that meant to set up a swingthrough. These are probably the two easiest ways to get started. Once you feel like you have a good set, start chucking gainers, and than eventually corks. I always suggest trying to practice the move until it becomes second nature, and then moving on to something harder. It's always best to have clean consistent tricks rather than huge, land them 1 in 10 tries kind of tricks.

The next step to swingthroughs is to try them out of a twisting move such as a btwist, cork, or even full twist. Once you feel comfortable swinging out of almost any move try doing more than one. Such as cork swingthrough cork, swingthrough gainer. Build yourself up until you can swingthrough continuously at ease. Swingthroughs are very difficult to get down solid, but once you learn them you feel like a beast when you're throwing down tricks.

I hope you guys can learn from this, and inspire some of you to do swingthroughs! Level up and keep on tricking. Here's a link to a video of me practicing swingthroughs! I'm still learning how to do them penis as well, so hopefully you can watch me fail and stick some tricks! Keep practicing those flips, kicks, and tricks.

XSD at Rampulla's! Kicks, flips, tricks, parkour!

Hey everyone,

Hope you all enjoyed last weeks post about one of my favourite trickers! This week I'm going to talk about flips, kicks, and tricks in Rampulla's XSD class. This class is dedicated to combine acrobatics, martial arts, stunts, and parkour all in one. The class ranges from basic to advanced levels, as well as a wide range of ages. It's challenging and fun at the same time, because students work their butts off to learn a trick or move, and when they get it, the feeling of achievement is amazing. 

The one thing I have learned from teaching XSD is that everyone learns differently, and everyone is going to learn things at a different place. I've seen some students learn tricks their first try and others take years of training to get it down. The most important thing I tell them is that if you work hard, and continue to work hard anything is possible. It took me a year and a half to learn a back tuck, and I trained that move every single day. Everyone learns at a different pace. 

What I leave about teaching students, is that I get the chance to see them grow, I've seen students who first started who could barely do a cartwheel, and now they are doing cartwheel fulltwists like it's nothing. The transformation is amazing to see, it also shows what hard work and dedication can do. 

I love teaching XSD because it's what I love doing. I love being able to share my knowledge with people who are interested in the same thing I am. Tricking, flips, stunts, parkour and martial arts is my life. I want to be able to teach them everything I know and make them the best they can be in all aspects of their life. I want to be able to inspire, and motivate them every day. That's what XSD means to me. 

I put together a quick video of one of the classes that I decided to a small vaulting set-up. Check it out and enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEtp5SV1I_s

Tricks, kicks, flips, from the best. Anis Cheurfa!

Hey everyone,

I hope you enjoyed last weeks episode of kicks, tricks, and flips. This week I'm going to be talking about one of my favourite trickers, who inspires me to trick. One of my all time favourite trickers, is Anis Cheurfa. If you're into tricking than you definitely know who he is, as well as his amazing style.

When I first started tricking I thought Anis was the greatest tricker, as I learnt more about tricking I began to like his style more, and more as I watched him. I started out liking him because he could do some of the hardest, and most difficult tricks at the time. He could swing through corks, like it was nothing, and spam dubs like it was nothing.

I began to truly understand his style, when I compared him to many other trickers. Almost everyone who tricks can do a cork screw, or spam a dub. It's not as impressive as it used to be. Anis has made his style so clean and crisp, every move he does looks perfect to the point that he must've done it a million times before. The reason I like his style is because when he does a kick, it's real, if he hit you with it, it would hurt a lot, and he makes sure his toes are pointed, and everything is done with perfect technique.

It looks as if he works on perfecting moves, instead of adding a twist, and I truly appreciate the way he perfects his moves, because he makes every move his own.

Take a look at this video and watch what tricking should look like!

This is what inspires me to be the best I can be!

Enjoy!!!!

2013 Demo Reel, tricks, flips, parkour, stunts, and martial arts

Hey everyone,

In this weeks post I'm going to be talking about some of the experiences I have had doing tricks, flips, and kicks.

In the past year I have put a lot of my efforts into getting into stunts for film and television. I started off doing small short films for friends, to get experienced. As I got better at stunts, I started doing auditions, for music videos, and ended up working as stunts, and stunt/actors for Alyssa Reid, Data Lyfe, Neverest, and Autoerotique. I've also done a web commercial for Coca-Cola, and an action video for IGN. As I've progressed in my career, I achieved my actra status byworking on an independent film called "Meza".

Some of the things that have helped my stunt career thus far, is having a lot of support from my friends and family, as well as all the training I have done.

Being good at tricking, acrobatics, martial arts, parkour all helps when trying to get into stunts. Being able to have a wide range of skills, is going to be better for you, than specializing in one of the skills above.

As you get more and more into stunts, you're going to realize some of the most important skills to have are breakfalls, wire work, high falls, and fight choreography.

I posted a video of footage of the work I've done, as well as some clips of previs, tricking, parkour, and martial arts.

I hope you enjoy the video! Check it out!

Check out bo staff martial arts tricking!

Hey everyone,

Hope you all enjoyed last weeks blogs about trick kicks! This week I'm going to be talking about bo staff tricks. Ever since I was a young kid studying Martial Arts, my favourite weapon was always the bo. 

I loved watching action movies with bo staffs in them, such as those really corny chinese movies with Jet Li in them. I started using the bo staff at the age of 7 when I was a blue belt in Tae Kwon Do. I would do private lessons with my instructor all the time, just so I could kick ass at tournaments. 

When ever I do bo staff tricking I try to create the most fluid way of doing a trick or move. I don't want to stand there and just do the trick because then I become a baton twirler, and that's not so cool. 

So what I try to do, is make all my movements stand out by finding cool ways to get into them and cool ways to finish them. Instead of standing there and doing a neck roll, I doing a 360 spin as I do the neck spin, to make it look more impressive.

Ever since I've started to doing flips, and tricks, I also like to implement them into my bo tricks. Sometimes I'll do 540 kicks in the air while spinning the bo behind my back, which looks really cool. Another thing I'll try to do is spin and throw the bo in the air and catch right before I do a flip, the transition into the flip ends up looking really cool. 

In the video below, you can check out some of the new bo tricks I have been working on. If you guys like it, subscribe for more videos, and comment what you would like to see next! Come back each week to check out Martial Arts, tricking, and parkour!

Enjoy!

Kicks!

Hey everyone!

Hope you enjoyed last weeks post on breakfalls and the video of me throwing myself to the ground in different ways. In this weeks post I am going to be talking about kicks! In tricking my favourite moves are always kicks, I find kicks so fun to do because your moving and spinning in so many different ways and unleashing a kick with the force to take someones head off. I think might have something to do with my martial arts background.

Now if you're like me you will find yourself practicing kick tricks all day long, because theres so much you can do with them. You can kick on the ground in the air, on your hands, and doing flips; the possibilities are endless.

The one thing I find these days in tricking is that people tend to pride themselves on doing the most amount of twists before they kick even if their kick only goes up to their waste. When I practice kick tricks I try to make each move distinct and sharp. I want to have full extension on my kick with pointed toes, and I try my best to get each kick as high as I can. Personally I would rather see a clean jacknife by Anis Cheurfa, then a cheat 1260 with a kick that is non existent.

Ways to improve the cleanliness of your kicks:

1. Stretch, stretch, and stretch. The more flexible you are the higher you're going to be able to get those kicks, and the more impressive they are going to look. (centre, and side splits)

2. Practice your basics, practice kicks on the ground such as your round house kicks, and hook kicks, and make sure you are point your toes, and getting full extension on the leg.

3. Kick a target! If you have something to hit while practicing basics or even trick kicks, your more likely to build up the habit of kick and snapping your kick as hard as you can.

4. Drill your kick tricks! Don't do it once and move on to the next move. Practice it until you can do it in your sleep.

5. Try doing it in combos, this makes it more challenging and more fun to do.

Here's a video of me practicing some kick tricks! Enjoy! Comment and Subscribe!

Breakfalls

Hey everyone!

Hope you enjoyed last weeks episode on hard ground training! I hope no one got hurt trying tricks on concrete last week, I still hope you are all improving!

So many of you may know me personally, and know that I am an aspiring stunt man for film and television. In man journey or quest, I have learnt that it takes more than just doing a couple flips, and a few spin kicks to be stunt man. The most important part about doing stunts, is falling and making it look painful. But before you can make it look like it hurts, you have to make sure you can fall safely.

So in this weeks blog I'm going to show you a video on some basic-advanced breakfalls. Note, that I myself am also working on my breakfalls and I'm still not happy with how they look. But I'm going to give you guys the opportunity to get a head start on them that I wish I had.

Steps to practice breakfalls:

If you have an instructor ask them to help you with them, if not film yourself doing it and be your own critique

Step 1: find a matt, mattress, sand, or any squishy surface that you can land on safely

Step 2: practice some of the basic breakfalls I demonstrate in the video below: front, side and back breakfall

Step 3: practice until you feel yourself land all at once, or in a way that you could land without getting hurt. Landing with your body hitting the ground all at once spreads the force out making it much less painful.

Step 4: try adding a twist or flip to make it more challenging

Step 5: once you can safely fall, try taking away layers of matts until you find yourself doing it onto normal ground.

Here's the video of me practicing some breakfalls at Rampulla's Martial Arts, in Georgetown Ontario.

Enjoy!

Hard Ground Training

Hey all,

Hope you enjoyed last weeks tutorial! This week I'm going to talk about ways to help you improve your tricks. Most people train their tricks on sprung floors, and use matts to land on. Yes! That is the safest way to learn and practice a trick. What trickers also tend to do (note: nothing wrong with this) is trick in their bare feet.

The point I'm trying to get across is that when most people train, we tend to train in the perfect environment where everything is easy to land and get height. Sprung floors give you tons of height if used properly, and matts cushion our landing. What also makes training easy is doing it bare foot, because there is no extra weight on your feet to slow you kicks and flips down.

The next point I'm trying to get at is, if you want to make your tricks more practical try doing them outside with shoes on to make your training more difficult. Training with shoes on will help increase your vert because you're adding weight to your feet. It's an easy way to push yourself to the next level.

What I also suggest doing (only for advanced trickers) is trying to do your tricks on concrete with shoes on. Training on concrete will strengthen your muscles tenfold because there is nothing to bounce you up or absorb your landing. When I train on concrete I only do tricks I'm 100% sure that I'll land every time. This isn't the place to try new skills, it's the place to strengthen your body, and improve your tricks.

In the video below I'm training on hard ground, with shoes on. It personally helps me level up, take a look and try it for yourself (only advanced trickers :P)

Back Tuck Tutorial

Hey all,

Welcome to the second blog in kicks, flips and tricks! I'm excited about this weeks topic because it's about a move that I wanted to learn ever since I was a young child.

Today, I'm going to give you a tutorial on a back tuck! I'm going to explain to you in steps that should help you learn this move in a fun and safe way. Before you try hucking (throwing yourself backwards, closing your eyes, and hoping for the best) make sure you try learning the basics before you break your neck. Too many people these days think they're invincible and try back tucks on flat ground or sometimes off picnic benches without any training! It makes me go crazy, because a buck tuck is not an easy move! It takes practice, and dedication just like any another trick you are ever going to learn.

Anyways enough with the ranting, here are the steps for a back tuck:

Step 1: Have a good spotter, and if it's your first time trying this move, make sure you have a soft matt to land on.

Step 2: Practice your set ( jumping and raising you hands high above your head to get max height)

Step 3: Get your spotter to help lift you onto his shoulder as you set, to get the feeling of starting to go backwards.

Step 4: Set onto the shoulder of your spotter, and this time tuck your knees as if you were to do a full flip.

Step 5: Set your arms, tuck your knees, and flip over your spotters shoulder with his/her assistance.

Step 6: Practice until your spotter doesn't have to help you flip over.

Step 7: Do the back tuck with your spotter assisting you from the side, making the flip greatly less assisted.

Step 8: Once, your spotter doesn't have to help you flip, try it on your own.

Watch this video to help you understand the steps. My good friend, Jonny Caines is performing the flip, and I'm spotting him. Note: he is a professional stuntman, and I'm a certified acrobatic instructor. Learning this flip might taking longer than a day. In fact when I was learning this flip it took me over a year to finally do it by myself. Some people learn faster than others though!

Intro to flips, kicks, and tricks

Hey guys,

I just want to give you all a little sneak peak of some of things I'm going to be discussing in this blog. Mainly I'll be discussing tips, as well as experiences that I've had while training martial arts, tricking, parkour, and other cool styles of movement. I'll be posting lots of videos: tutorials, levelling up (which i'll discuss later on), and sometimes just cool tricks that I've learned and want to show to you all. I'll also be discussing training tips for beginner, intermediate, and advanced trickers/parkour artists, so that you can help further your training. The one thing that you must always do is be safe when training, and learning new moves; getting injured is the best way to stop yourself from improving, and nobody has time for that! Try using matts and spotters depending on your skill level, to help keep you safe. At the same time don't be too safe to the point where you are to afraid to try new skills. I'll be going into detail later on about safety tips in another blog, but you get the idea for now.

In case you were wondering, I have been studying karate for about 18 years, acrobatics for 7, tricking for 7 and parkour for about 5 years. I have put in a lot of hours at the gym and at home to get where I am today. This has been my passion for the past 7 years, and probably will be for the rest of my life. I hope some of you can share the love I have for movement with me.

 I hope you enjoy the first video, and teaser to this blog, and in it there is: flips, kicks, tricks, parkour and stunts. There is also a little sneak preview at the end of the video that I'll be blogging about as well, even though it's not my strength.

Enjoy, comment, and subscribe.