Big thanks to our sponsors for helping out with the prizes:
Freedom Footbags
Fourkast Footbags
Bomb Footbags

Overall Standings – http://modified.in/footbag/viewtopic.php?p=450568#450568
Video 1 – Bsos 3 http://www.shredglobal.com/archive/bsos-3-results-video/
Video 2 – The Luns http://www.shredglobal.com/archive/shred-global-event-2-video-released/
Video 3 – FDS http://www.shredglobal.com/archive/shred-global-event-3-results-announced/

As a tribute to the one of the founding fathers, Flipsider.com, Shred Global is happy to announce the 4th and final event of the First Annual Shred Global Footbag Season. The deadline for this event will be 11:59 PM PST April 20th. The concept of this event is to show your versatility with the 4 main sets (each toe and each clipper) and then give you a 5th trick shot at something huge!

The prizes being awarded for this event are:
1) The final points towards the $500 grand prize given to the person with the most points after all 4 events
2)$50 to the winner of the event
3) a Hania bag.
4) some various sponsored items from Freedom Footbags, Fourkast Footbags, and Bomb Bags.

The rules are as follows.
1) One submission video per person, sent to submissions@shredglobal.com on or before 11:59 PM PST April 20th.
2) The combo (5-tricks) must be started from a drop (with warmups kicks allowed prior to the first trick in the combo) and finished with a hand catch after the final trick.
3) The only rules is that the first 4 tricks must be set in the following order with the fifth being your choice
trick 1) Toe
trick 2) Flipside Toe
trick 3) Clipper
trick 4) Flipside Clipper
trick 5) and surface / set
–The Flipside designation meaning it is done from the other side then the original for the sake of this contest–
4) the judging criteria will be Creativity , cleanliness, and of course difficulty of the trick, with all three having the same importance for the sake of this event.
5) Any questions on any of this please email to submissions@shredglobal.com

Have fun guys, we look forward to all of the great submissions, and may the best contestant win!

Name: Derrick Fogle
Location: Columbia MO
Site: http://h4x354x0r.com
See All Derrick Fogle Articles

For 2011, I only carry over the footbag and bike mileage goals. Well, I also tweeted, “Do more fishing.” Considering I only got to go fishing 3 times last year, that shouldn’t be hard to beat. I hope. The rest? No promises, no goals. I’m just gonna deal with it a day at a time.

———-

On to footbag, the primary purpose of this blog. Today marked my 1st session of 2011. I had a chance to play footbag at the MU Rec center (they’re running a ‘trial membeship’ promotion), and at first I was really stoked about it. I’d be able to bring my camera in, and make a footbag blog video. But then, I realized I probably couldn’t bring my boombox in. Music is to my footbag, as breathing is to life. So, I bailed on the Rec center thing, and went back to the Secret Hideout. I can’t film in the secret hideout, because it wouldn’t be so secret anymore. So, no hassle of setting up a camera, and plenty of music!

It was a fairly average session, but I did hit a 30-contact “tiltless” string. “Tiltless” means a difficulty level of 3 or greater. In footbag, each aspect of difficulty is called an “add” becaue each thing beyond a basic kick adds a difficulty point. Stalling the bag on the foot (instead of just kicking it): 1 “add”. Going around the bag (a leg-over): another “add”. Spinning or doing a “cross-body” (touching the bag on the left side of your body, but with the right foot), another “add”.

To be honest, there are young punks that make me look like I’ve got broken legs. For every time I can go around the bag once, they can do it twice, maybe 3 times. The average difficulty level among today’s elite footbag players is over 4; mine is barely 2. OTOH, here I am, throwing down my own gauntlet: “OK, punks, keep that up for another 20-25 FUCKING YEARS.” Few athletes are still active in their sport at 47. I am. I have no intention of quitting.

I put in 1:30 tonight. That brings me back to the blog’s title: resetting the counter. It’s always a bit of a bummer to do that, but it also renews the drive; fuels the fire. At the end of almost every footbag-centric blog post, I end it with a line thats [today's time] [year's total time] Thanks for tuning in! So…

1:30 1:30 Thanks for tuning in!

Name: Scott Davidson
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Website: http://footbagfreestyle.blogspot.com/
See all Scott Davidson Posts here!

This is the best tip ever. Thanks to Steve Goldberg, Brat, the greatest benefactor to the sport of footbag.

This has come full circle. I started by skooling the basics. As I got better, I learned the “Economy of Motion” and got better at trimming time off of movement by finding and training more efficient paths. Spending less effort to get more done. Particularly when ending a trick, I have learned over time to catch the footbag with the minimum downward motion possible, which is one of many ‘economy of motions.’ To make matters worse, I spent about week this summer focusing on ‘rooted’ tricks http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmRXODg6Bzg which are distinguished because the catching foot is the plant.

This reduction of downward motion in catching the footbag in order to complete my most difficult tricks is causing my form to suffer when doing the most basic versions of the tricks. For instance, it is generally more efficient to complete a Paradox Torque by expending as little effort as possible on the catch, and doing it at the last moment. On the other hand, the trick is more ‘solid’ when I am able to utilize ‘economy of motion’ during the dexterity part of the trick and spend more time on the ‘catching’ part of the trick.

One of the side effects of spending years of training to reduce the distance needed to catch a footbag at the end of advanced tricks, is when you do the basic component, it looks rushed and unpolished.

As a part of my daily training (1493 in a row today), I warm up using my ‘basic’ staple tricks. For instance I don’t want to spend too much time training tricks I have mastered, I use those to warm up with. I do 10 osis, 10 infinity’s, 10 ripwalks, I do 10 reps of my whirl/osis combo, ripwalks, blurs/blizzards and paradox whirls. I am getting into the zone at this time and generally just gaining the proper focus I need for the rest of my jam session. Thanks to this new tip, I am really gaining better basic form.

In the past few weeks focusing on the depth of my clipper catches and I can really feel a difference in my control and general ability to maintain long strings. I am really happy that a friend like Steve took the time to mention this very basic observation to me at the New Years Jam this past December. I have been working on it every day since then and am really feeling the difference!

Shred Notes: Jan 2011
In addition to working the solidness of my clipper tricks, I have spent a lot of time working on front side tricks. I have particularly been recategorizing Atomic tricks into low-impact. I have always thought of Atomic tricks as high-impact, but have recently discovered that they really aren’t. I hit both Atom Smashers in a single string, which was a big barrier for me, but might seem basic for you. I also realized that I have been hitting LegBeaters on both sides (I’ve been calling them atomic butterflies), and then was challenged by Tuukka to do blur, LegBeater, Blurry Whirl, Blur, LegBeater Blurry whirl and hit all those components with an extra spinning butterfly before the 2nd blur. Very happy.

Coming out of Poland is one of the best pure shred videos I have seen this year. If you dig big shred, this is a must see video. check out the guys from Poland (www.footbag.com.pl) as you get introduced to some of the biggest names in Europe. Easily one of the most impressive videos put together in a long time.

It’s been the cornerstone of my development. First physically as I got in shape as a 12 year old. Then it was personally, as I was able to be proud of my ability to play well, and thus become proud of myself. Finally its been my vehicle of friendship, where I’ve made so many friends all over the world and had so many great times with so many excellent people.

But where did it go wrong -

The pressures of needing to get a ‘real job’ – I guess as I put it myself when explaining my life to a Primary School teacher this week ‘Footbag probably won’t pay a mortgage’. I’m not even interested in getting a mortgage – I’d rather invest in the banks then be prey to them. Its part of the story – but Footbag has also been my main source of income throughout uni and meant that I never had to get a typical part time job.

Loss of the close friends who I had when I was learning. I probably wouldn’t have kept playing after one year if it weren’t for Lynton Stephens and Brendan Erskine. I probably wouldn’t have kept playing if it weren’t for Alex Urano and Scott Kirchner. The only thing that kept me in Footbag after those guys left was my love of teaching – my love of the game was never the same.

When I think about Footbag now I think about Jesenik and playing with Milan Benda, Daniel Spacil, Karel Hak – if he ever plays again lol. But while I was there I realised that I just wanted to play with the people I started playing with, I wasn’t really interested in improving my game – I felt my Footbag spirituality meter had dropped.

Spending time with Vasek and writing the Vasek Klouda Manual was exciting, and I am so inspired by his words and life in general. The thing that excited me most was the potential for people all over the world to be reading that e-book, then improving incredibly, and all the joy that would bring them. I wasn’t excited about my own game improving, after ten years of playing I had lost the desire to keep pushing my own boundaries – but I feel good that other people still love to see me play, and that they love Footbag.

I’m going to write more about Footbag over the coming weeks
Follow me on google reader or another RSS

In order to promote what will probably be one of the top 3 freestyle footbag videos of the year, we give you from the great country of Canada….. “Badassery”

To check out some of the reviews of this video, or for updated information, please look here http://modified.in/footbag/viewtopic.php?t=21933

From the desks of team Badassery…

Badassery is an entirely new footbag video, made by Canadians Jay Boychuk and Jorden Moir. The video showcases 100 moves that the public has never seen, all edited within 27 minutes of HD video. This video has multiple sections, including over 6 minutes of string footage. To get ready to see footbag like you’ve never seen it before, click the following link for purchase details.

Video Info:
BADASSERY: 100 Moves You’ve Never Seen
NOW AVAILABLE!!!!
Total Runtime: 26:38
File Size: 2.64 GB
File Type: MPEG
Res: 1280/720 (High-Definition!)

Payment Info
Cost: $15 CAD/USD or 12€
Method: PayPal or Cash (in well-sealed envelope)
Arrow PayPal: jorden.moir@gmail.com

or Address:
Jorden Moir
14 Mulberry St.
Hamilton, ON, CA
L8R 2C5

**Only streaming available at the moment, while we sort out an HD downloading issue. Will be resolved soon**

Upon payment received, an E-mail will be sent to the E-mail that sent payment with the viewing information. Please check within a few hours of payment to see if you got a message. If not, please PM me. Thanks.

This blog is mostly about me and my game, but I’m thinking that when I see a video that stokes me enough to go play, that I should post it … with that in mind, check this:

Penske Visit Oct 2010 from nate linscott on Vimeo.

JIm Penske, Nick Landes and Gordon Bevier play footbag in Portland Oregon, USA.

Name: Scott Davidson
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Website: http://footbagfreestyle.blogspot.com/
See all Scott Davidson Posts here!

Specifically: .. Phobic Gyro Symposium Whirl, Phobic (opp) Blender and Reverse Twirls.

I am fluent in many spinning tricks, and in many ducking tricks. And until recently, the only trick I had thought to combine spinning and ducking on, was SDButterfly, as featured on tricks of the trade 2.

Tuukka challenged me last week to hit a spinning or a ducking twirl, and it got me to really skool those tricks. This week so far, I have hit Spinning Ducking Whirls on both sides, Spinning Ducking Barfly’s (ducking scorpiontail) both sides.

This movie has: Phobic Gyro Symposium Whirl (from 2 angles), Pixie Same Swirl, Reverse Twirl (thin), Phobic (opp) Blender. The movie was filmed with my iphone4, using apps ranging from ‘camera’ to ‘slomo’ to ‘imovie extras’ (for titles) and of course ‘imovie’.

Keep inspiring me! It seems to work!
Thanks!
Scott!

Name: Scott Davidson
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Website: http://footbagfreestyle.blogspot.com/
See all Scott Davidson Posts here!

For our sport to properly develop to it’s potential, we need more structured events AND we need to do more youth outreach to promote Footbag to kids and parents for it’s great health and social benefits.

This means YOU!

I sit here, saddened, outside the home of the directors of the Funtastik Summer Classic, where I can’t escape the reality that this family tradition is about to see it’s last repetition. Tournaments like this, with now 25 years running have a cult following which draws out all the top players and enthusiasts to a single location, for a weekend of friendly competition and general Footbag mania. So many thanks to Brenda and Joe Solonoski for hosting this event year after year, for opening their home to us, and for bringing together so many of our friends into a single location. It breaks my heart that this is the last Funtastik Summer Classic!

Every self-respecting club needs to run at least one event each year, and do some youth outreach for the good of mankind.

Check www.kickforhealth.org for info about the ‘Footbag Challenge’ and how this can be a great vehicle to promote the health aspects of Footbag.

If you want to run a tournament, it doesn’t have to be a mammoth 3-day event, but I have been running Footbag events for 25 years in the Chicago area and I promise to help coach any aspiring tournament directors who want to have an event in your area.

It all starts right here, right now! We need more tournaments. Period. Contact me now!
Www.kickforhealth.org

-enlightener
Scott Davidson
1999 Freestyle World Champion

In order to provide good basis for comparing the available footbag shoes, it is important to understand what we should compare. Below you will read a somewhat technical interpretation of what it is to have a good footbag shoe, so that when you read about each model you will be given a fair metric to judge the shoes upon. Not all shoes are created equal, and not all players play in shoes equally. It is important to note that your body and style can try to adapt to shortcomings or downfalls of any model.

Simply from a mechanical standpoint, the best footbag shoe must support the movements we see in footbag. They can be the landing from a symposium whirl, the completely vertical force which is transferred through the rest of your body simply through the bones and muscle of that leg. It must support the horizontal forces from a drifter->spinning set, where your ankle is locked and twisted but the remaining sections of your body are twisting. The shoe must be light enough that while doing a quantum set you do not overextend your knee and have the effect of a ball and chain on your foot. These aspects of the shoe are very tightly correlated to the sole of the shoe, since it provides the damping of forces, the friction for giving you a good response, and often a large portion of the weight on your foot.

After you diagnose what makes the movement necessary for successfully playing footbag, you can realize that the interaction between the foot and the footbag is vitally important. The shoe needs to grab the bag, and give you the surfaces necessary to allow your body to direct it in seemingly unnatural directions. Between toe and clipper, the most used surfaces in today’s freestyle footbag, you must provide the perfect regions in which you can both catch and release the footbag. You must also provide the perfect amount of friction in order to properly release the bag without gripping too much.

1) Adidas Rod Laver

–The Rod Lavers are the standard for a footbag shoe. They are easily found, moderately priced, and with a few key modifications can be made into a very playable shoe.

–Players who wear Lavers (2010 World Champion Milan Benda, 2011 Female Circle World Champion Hania Mickiewicz, Serge Kaldany)

–Milan Benda says “I play in lavers, I like them because they are stable even if they are not broken in.”

–Serge Kaldany says “They are light and once broken in feel like a second skin.”

2) Quantum 1/2/3

–Extremely light, but lacking any real foot support.

–Players who wear Quantums (2011 World Routine Champion Honza Weber,2011 Female World Champion Jana Sassakova)

–Honza Weber says “Quantums are light, flexible, and allow for optimum leg quickness”

3) Reebok G-Unit

–Heavier then all of their counterparts, but offers shock absorption that the others could only dream of.

4) Nucleus

–Made for use in Freestyle Footbag, including a pre-made toe box that allows for excellent toe-stalling right out of the box. The clipper catching area is not optimum, but it will force you to gain excellent clipper form.

5) Adidas Clima Cool

Name: Scott Davidson
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Website: http://footbagfreestyle.blogspot.com/
See all Scott Davidson Posts here!

I came across these tricks that I have visited before, but never got on tape or even discussed them that I can remember. The Barfly has always been a challenge for me to do solidly, and I have been working on them for literally 20 years now. I’ve been doing a lot of Rakes lately, especially cross-body Rakes. This past week, my peanut butter got into my chocolate and I brought Barfly together with Cross Body Rake and made a BarFlake. I know this has another street name, as I know it has been done before, but because I live in a vacuum I don’t know what it is called. I didn’t stop there, I have also done versions starting with Fairy, Pixie, Stepping-opp, Stepping-same and spinning. All on this film, and with slo-mo to reveal the thinness. All kind of thin, they look good from above. It is especially noticeable since I had to use an up-angle when I was filming.

I also hit a Blur that has an extra Symposium Mirage before the toe pickup. Also in slo-mo. It was suggested that this is a stepping paratoxic (backside symposium) blur, I don’t know what to call it, which is why I put it online for peer review.

Shred notes: 1st two weeks of August…
Played through my injury from last week of July, it is no longer effecting me at all, thank goodness. I’ve been obsessed with these new tricks. Been lucky with weather! Totally lucky, like cloudy-icky mornings turning to sun literally as I arrive at the Mammoth Springs Training Center. Mosquitos everywhere near the river, but not on the asphalt playing surface that I utilize. I’m going to Funtastik and I have been getting some NICE run-thru’s of my routine! I’m gonna be ready again this year and I look forward to a great event!

Name: Scott Davidson
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Website: http://footbagfreestyle.blogspot.com/
See all Scott Davidson Posts here!

We couldn’t make it to Worlds 2010. We went to Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore to have a mini-vacation. I got injured on the last Saturday of July and have still played everyday. This video is my recovery video, it shows how the range of motion improved over the week of recovery.

Congratulations to Milan and Clavens and everyone who succeeded at Worlds 2010 this year! Wish we could have been there. This is what I was up to… This video includes the new trick concept outline for “Spotted Tricks”… I’ve been doing Spotted Osis on both sides for years, but never saw the potential… check out Spotted Mirage and Spotted Torque, both feel like Gyro versions of their tricks and involve lots of twisting. Please ignore the music.

See ya!

-enlightener

Name: Derrick Fogle
Location: Columbia MO
Site: http://h4x354x0r.com
See All Derrick Fogle Articles

Uh-oh, sound system FAIL… I’m UNPLUGGED!

I was about to bail on my session when a group of kids stopped by to kick. Kept me going for a while, and I ended up putting in an hour and a half. I also shot musicless video from lots of different angles. I’m trying to put together a video about the venue in general.

Having the kids drop by and kick for a bit was awesome, but the rest of the session – without music – was decidedly uninspired. I’m totally addicted to having music to kick to; I suck without it. Oh well. Sound system will be working again next week.

1:30/40:00 – Thanks for tuning in!

Name: Freedom Footbags
Location: Nampa, Idaho
Website: http://www.freedomfootbags.com

It’s that time of year again, time to head to Portland and shred with Sole Purpose and other footbaggers from around the country, and the world! In 2007 Jim Penske was crowned national champ, only to have David Clavens take it from him the following year. In 2009 Jim wanted the chance to reclaim the title, but instead attended his brother’s wedding in Northern Idaho. Scott Bevier, a new transplant to Portland, currently holds the title. I can still remember his awesome routine at the Nautilus event site in Vancouver, Washington (just across the river from Portland). The choreography was excellent!

There is going to be a lot of talent at this weekend’s event. With the World Championships beginning the following week, many Europeans have made their way to the US and will be competing at both events. I can’t wait to see all the amazing shred! I especially love the Water Temple Shred on Monday, after the official tournament has come to a close.

If you are in the area, come check it all out! And if you don’t make it, you can find the results online at www.footbag.org That’s also where you’ll find all the info to get you there. Peace

Oh, and here is a video of Scott’s winning routine from 2009.

Name: Scott Davidson
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Website: http://footbagfreestyle.blogspot.com/
See all Scott Davidson Posts here!

Bummed that I can’t make Worlds2010. Physically depressed. But I won’t let that stop me.

If I didn’t videotape myself at the end of each jam session, I don’t think I would remember half of what I accomplish. This 10 minute movie may bore the uninitiated to death, but for me it is my passion. I love freestyle footbag, as it continues to challenge both my mind and body!

These videos serve my sense of posterity. In 20 years, I’ll look back at these days in fond memory of how my game has evolved. I fully expect to be playing freestyle footbag into my 60′s, and these will serve as a nice comparison…

High speed subject (me) and new iPhone4 video camera. If I didn’t make these videos, I might forget what I hit. Long strings coming tomorrow in separate video. This video contains a trick that is NEW to mankind: Spinning Ducking Xbody Whirling Rake. Seamless Juggles from Blurs, Gyro Mirages and Fairy mirages. Whirling Sole to Symposium whirl. Fairy Ducking Barfly. Blurry Whirling Cross Body Rake. Insane threading strings, including new Sewing Machine sets. Ducking Symposium Whirl. Mobius to Double Osis. Pendulum Sets into torque. (Just hit Pendulum set to paradox drifter today, not on tape yet). Fairy Ducking Cross Body Rake. Among tons of other tricks. More daily.

Name: Andrew McCargar
Location: Portland, Oregon
Website: http://www.outsideworld.org/footbag/index.html

Preamble

The BAP, for those who don’t already know, is a players’ organization of the top footbag freestylers in the world. To enter active members must vote you in. This vote usually takes place only once a year at the world footbag championships, but exceptions have been made. At one point in my life it meant a great deal to get in to BAP.

Disclaimer

Before I begin the story though, I feel a disclaimer is needed. First, my comments about world’s 2002 are not meant to be any kind of impartial record, rather they reflect my state of mind at the time and as such are heavily biased. There was originally a version of this story that named a lot more names, but aside from not wanting to piss anyone off, the names are a little beside the point, this is a personal story and ultimately I’m the only one responsible for myself. Second if you were playing around the time this story takes place and remember anything differently I’d love to hear about it (I’m far from a perfect source of history), so please leave a comment below or send me an email. Ok, here we go:

The Quest For BAP

I first touched a “Hacky Sack” in summer 1994. I have to laugh whenever I hear someone say they’re not coordinated enough for Footbag. That first time we must have played for more than an hour and I think I managed to touch the bag a total of 4 times, the rest of the time the bag just flew mockingly past my feet. After that I didn’t see another Footbag until around March 1995. I was going to a small school then and there wasn’t much else to do, so we’d gather in a circle hopelessly trying to get a “hack.” I think it took me the better part of 3 weeks to get up to a dozen kicks.

I finally broke down and with my meager allowance bought my very own knit bag. Maybe my natural talent was finally showing through, more likely it was my obsessiveness, but either way I quickly became the best kicker at my school. That wasn’t saying much. Anyway even at that point, only a few weeks in, just counting consecutives was wearing thin and I needed something else. The kid who’d brought the first Hacky Sack to school told me the real pros could be found at the Saturday Market and I was determined to find them. As it turns out I didn’t until I accidentally invited myself over to Kenny Shults’ house, but there were still plenty of people for me to learn from.

If I wasn’t a prodigy I was at least making steady progress. At first I think Footbag was just something to do, everyone’s a little awkward at that age and Footbag let me meet new people. But soon enough I was learning my first tricks and became more and more fascinated with the sport and by extension everything about it. I discovered footbag.org and watched the few videos they had religiously. I remember how one night I watched a tape of the 1996 Heart of Freestyle tournament and the next day got super excited and hit my first torque, in jeans. There was this amazing group of athletes I knew only from video who called themselves BAP and I wanted to be one of them.

I guess I started out having some curious ideas about Footbag, but in general I think I wasn’t that far off of a lot of new players. I can only guess at what players think of BAP now, but when I was getting started and first heard of it’s existence BAP was a very exclusive club. There were 16 members, 14 of them active who I can still name from memory (Kenny Shults, Peter Irish, Tim Kelly, Genzu, Greg Nelson, Rick Reese, Denis Jones, Eric Wulff, Ahren Gehrman, Steve Cramer, Scott Davidson, Paul Munger, Josh Casey and Tuan Vu).

I’ll admit to a bit of hero worship and when I went to my first world’s in 1997 I knew them all by sight. 1997 was something of a landmark year for footbag. A new generation showed up with some interesting new ideas. I saw quantum, atomic and blazing, even though we didn’t know what they were. I’ll never forget watching Peter Irish hitting leggy style blurry flux and being blown away. 6 new players were added to BAP that year. In case you’re curious I didn’t even merit an honorable mention, but I was hell bent to get in.

I taped some carpet to the floor of my basement, hung a florescent light and made myself go down and play for 2 hours a day. If I wasn’t completely hooked already it was that period that really got me. Most sports were too abstract for me. The difference between a great footballer (soccer player for my American readers) and a good one is hard to quantify. But in footbag when you hit that first paradox whirl, that first torque… you’re not just refining your craft, you can concretely do something you couldn’t do before. I think you need to be a player yourself to fully appreciate what a rush it is and I hit a lot of new moves during that time, each of them a dizzying high like no other. I also lost a couple bags thrown out of frustration. These days I tend to think of freestyle more as a social activity, but there’s something to be said for practicing alone. You’re responsible for no one but yourself, your triumphs and disappointments are yours alone. For as long as it lasted I got pretty good. Although such a thing is hard to judge I’d say by the time I left for Germany in 1998 I was probably somewhere in the top 50.

If I was top 50 in the world back then, I was probably the best player in continental Europe when I arrived. Although it was something of an ego boost, I was often treated like something of a celebrity when I traveled to footbag clubs, it was also frustrating not to have anyone to play with. Fortunately I was still motivated, able to travel and had access to the internet. I kept practicing, usually alone, and traveled as much as I could. One of the things I’ve only gained with age is a certain amount of tact. It’s fortunate I didn’t have it back then because I would shamelessly invite myself all over the place in Europe just by telling people I was a Footbag player from America, I’d like to visit your club, oh and do you have a couch I can crash on? I can’t imagine what they must have thought, but everyone seemed glad to have me. The scene was exploding, which slowly made up for my semi-isolation in Munich, but I still longed to make it to worlds, play with the top players and show them what I could do.

At Euro’s in Paris 2000, owing partly to me not concentrating on my second degree as much as I should have, I was on the top of my game. The first day we were on a big outdoor stage and for some reason everything was working for me. It seemed like every time I touched the bag I was cranking out at least 20 contacts and hitting my biggest combos with ease. It was while I was still warming up that I met Lon Smith. I’d heard his name but never seen him play before. I immediately loved his style and we quickly fell into the freestyle conversation of new sets and tricks. For what it’s worth while I was doing my blurry whirl drill (still a big trick back then) Steve Goldberg told me if I could make it to worlds I’d get BAPtized.

The whole story of Euro’s 2000 I’ll leave for another day, but Ahren Gehrman deserves a special mention. Although he was my age Ahren was part of the older generation. He’d been BAPtized in 1996, and I’ve heard people claim he was the top shredder that year. He’d gotten a little rusty but then came back in 2000 in a big way. He was hitting some combos and moves then that still hold up pretty well after all these years. I saw him hit “your mom” along with a lot of other crazy stuff. I saw him hit atomic whirl and a couple strings later I did it myself, first try, mid run. I was on one hell of a run that tournament. Sadly it didn’t extend to the actual competition where I placed 6th. Fortunately I got drunk on gold mettle winning French wine, bitched loudly about the judging and felt better.

After that I went from partial isolation to the total isolation of South Korea. The first few months I had a light work schedule, was still pumped from Paris and determined to hit everything I’d seen Ahren do. I skooled both sides, all sets and all kinds of new tricks. I made my own shoes modifying the holy hell out of a pair of high top running shoes. The combination of energy, time and good gear seemed to work and everything clicked. In practice I was consistently cranking out tripless runs in the mid to high teens, skooling new 5 add combos and to 6 and beyond. The climax, as it were, came when I hit 15 new moves in one day. A few weeks after that I hit my first 7 add move. I knew the Footbag scene pretty well back then and I’d guess I was somewhere in the top 20.

For the last part of 2000, with no gym and no one to kick with I tried to keep playing and keep motivated, but eventually my job tried to kill me. For about 6 months I was working 13 hour days and quickly lost interest in anything that didn’t involve sleep, alcohol or my growing collection of dvds. Towards the end of my year there I was physically and mentally done. I finagled my employers to let me out of my contract a couple weeks early so I could make it to Euro’s in Prague and headed out. When I made it back to Europe in summer 2001 I was badly out of shape and out of practice. Still, I could do a few new things and the footbag world hadn’t passed me by. It was there I got to see a young Vasek, Ryan Mulroney, Eric Wulff, Mika “Puka” Koistinen and many more. I was able to hold my own and even show young Vasek a few tricks. Let the record forever show that I beat him in a game of “shred.”

Again I had a great time, Prague is the happiest place on earth, and I have a lot of fond memories. BAP was still in my mind and I could have gone to world’s instead of Euro’s and had a chance to get in, but Prague was more important to me. In retrospect that subconscious decision was something of a turning point in my Footbag “career,” but at the time I never stopped to work it out.

If I had to guess I’d say those two years, 2000 and 2001 I was somewhere in the top 20 or 30, but top 30 is a hell of a long way from number 1. After that I went back to Portland where I found a lot had changed in 3 years. A lot of people still kicked, but the freestyle scene had dried up and blown away. I managed to track down some new kid named Noah Jay-Bonn who wasn’t bad, but he still lived at home and couldn’t meet that often. 3 years of not having a club or steady playing partner had taken it’s toll and I was struggling to stay motivated, but when I watched video of the top players, of Lon, Ryan, Ahren, Peter and Chad, I could see they were still a level above me, but the gap wasn’t so great I couldn’t bridge it. I could hit or was close to the tricks and combos they were doing. It’s hard to give up when you can see the finish line, so I kept trundling along.

I went to world’s 2002 a little rusty again but I thought I still had a shot at BAP. I played alright the first day, like every world’s I met a lot of new kids I’d never heard of and got to see Vasek again, who although he still wasn’t quite the monster he would become was working a lot of tricks I could tell were leading to unexplored territory. I reconnected with a lot of people I hadn’t seen in years and generally felt pretty good. One thing that did kind of weigh me down was the etiquette nazis who were in full force that year. One of them in particular I found particularly grating, but more on that later. In the end none of it, my dwindling motivation, lack of practice and other people sucking the fun out of the sport mattered. It didn’t matter because I quickly came down with the second worst flu of my life.

The next day it was 93F (34C) without a cloud in the sky. Most players were out enjoying the sun trying to show off what they’d learned shredding alone in their basements the last year. I however was bundled under three sweaters shivering in the sun. I scratched out of all events and was only able to play for another hour or so that whole tournament. I saw history being made when Vasek beat Ryan in the finals. I saw the epic “silent night” shred, Honza’s amazing sick 3 combos, and Alex Zerbe’s surprising final 8 routine, but I saw it all from the sidelines.

Usually at tournaments it’s the camaraderie and the energy that I enjoy as much as playing itself. I love standing in a circle seeing everyone challenge and hopefully surprise each other with their sickest combos. You prop each other up, push each other to crank out your best freestyle. Perhaps it’s because I was already in a bad mood being sick, but there was an air around some of the top circles that I found stifling. One player in particular would yell at people for self serving a dropped kick before a run had even started and even louder if he thought you’d ‘the’d or bailed. I’m not going to name names because I don’t want to demonize anyone, but if you were there you probably know who I’m talking about. At any rate, it completely killed it for me. I couldn’t play, and what was otherwise a very exciting world’s was drowned out by a couple people way to caught up in their own rules.

I think I realized at the time it was my last shot for BAP and at that point it was still something I wanted. I had worked hard over the years to get my game to where it was, I had paid my dues traveling and bringing advanced freestyle to a lot of places and the recognition would have been appreciated. But at that point, more than the recognition I had just wanted to play well. My game was forcibly shut down by illness and even just hanging around a lot of the circles wasn’t any fun thanks to a couple grating individuals. I felt like I didn’t belong in a place where the “rules” had taken on more import than the game itself so I left. I didn’t go to Footbag sites on-line and I didn’t play very much. Back in Portland the Footbag scene took off around me. Ethan Husted moved in, then Noah and more recently Nick Landes took off. I was barely there.

Now that I’ve reconnected somewhat with the footbag scene a strange thing has happened. Whereas while I was living in Munich I was the new young player, now living in Berlin I’m the old man of Footbag. Every now and again I’ll reconnect with someone I haven’t seen in forever and they’ll ask me if I was ever BAPtised. At some point I realized what a load off my mind it is that it never happened, that I have a certain amount of anonymity.

As I look back I realize that up to World’s 2002 I was always chasing something. First it was the other kids in my class, then a consecutives record, then the move list and BAP. For a long time Ryan Mulroney was our target, then Ahren, Sunil and Lon and now Vasek. I saw a lot of guys push themselves to great heights chasing BAP and I’ve seen many more burn themselves out and fade away. Maybe I’m one of them. The strange thing is I’m not chasing anything anymore, I’m just playing. I’m still learning, and year on year I’m getting better, but the freestyle elite have long since passed me by and I like it this way. I can dip in and out as my time dictates and bore all of you with my old stories. I used to beat myself up with frustration if I couldn’t master a new trick, now I focus on what I can do. I still have my own demons but they’re measured by me and no one else now.

I think, if possible I love this sport now more than I ever have. For the last 14 years it’s been one of the few constants in my life and I have nothing but good memories (even my flu at World’s 2002 ended up being a good thing in the long run). For all of you out there chasing Vasek and whoever comes after him, everyone shredding only with a webcam in your basement somewhere or making that winning routine and hoping to impress BAP at Worlds this year in Prague, don’t give up, you may not get there, but it’s one hell of a trip.

Name: Scott Davidson
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Website: http://footbagfreestyle.blogspot.com/
See all Scott Davidson Posts here!

It was Independence Day, July 4th 2010 in our hometown of Oak Park, IL and we had marched, or shredded, in the parade for the past 5 years running. Our sponsor was not in the parade this year so we decided to just jump in as the parade gets going and fill in the gap between two floats. It turned out that we might have been the most energetic and unique entry, and we weren’t even officially there. Check it out!

Later that day, we went to DMB at Alpine Valley and shredded in the parking lot twice and again on the deck waiting for Dave to get on stage. Then we relaxed. Total blast of a day.

Shred notes; 7.6.2010
This week was busy, and as I still continue to recover from my self-inflicted toe injury, I have NOT broken my streak. Today was 1293 in a row! We did Taste of Chicago last weekend, this weekend we did Los Lonely Boys and Los Lobos concert at Petrillo Bandshell shreds, then the Parade and DMB. Yesterday at Great America theme park. Shredded at lunch today, mostly routine stuff. Can’t play music and record video from iphone4 at the same time, no problem, time to whip out the old shuffle!

Name: Scott Davidson
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Website: http://footbagfreestyle.blogspot.com/
See all Scott Davidson Posts here!

Life is teaching me a lesson about pain. How serious it is when someone is in constant pain, please take them seriously and try to make them comfortable. It is mentally debilitating. It effects my every moment. I work hard, I play hard and I love every minute of it. My intention is to perform my best at every moment, in every aspect of my life. To lead by example. Even in the best of situations, it is difficult to stay in the moment. When pain like this is present, it makes its way to the foreground and hampers my best efforts at excellent performance. It distracts me from my focus on performing well in the moment, and makes me just try to survive it.

I tried to take a short nap before the Argentina vs. Mexico world cup game today, and I thought about how the pain is amplified by landing on my right foot. Really, it was the shoe constricting against the swollen toe that causes the pain. I was in so much pain when I was at work this week, standing all day in tight fitting shoes. I would wear sandals to work, but the new rules there technically keep me from that and I think it is unsafe to wear open toe shoes when riding a xootr anyway. It occurred to me that regardless of how it looks, I need to relieve my pain at work so just standing there doesn’t make me cringe in pain, I need to convert a pair of old Rod Laver shoes into Genzu modified Rod Lavers. I looked up Daryl’s blog and found the picture that changed my day.

Today I modified a pair of old blue Rod Laver’s so the right toe is open like Daryl ‘Genzu’ Genz’s. It worked, an orthopedic success! Especially since the only shoes I ever wear are Rod Laver tennis shoes. I did a footbag demo at Taste of Chicago with Alex and Valeria, and I made it through the two hours with the microphone, and another hour kicking with the CIC guys by Buckingham Fountain. I got some good footage and will publish a movie soon. It was hard to set the footbag off of my right toe because of the intensity of effect caused by my toe curl, but I could figure that out if I had to. My infection did get worse and the swelling went up, but I was able to bear it. I hope this infection passes, because living with pain like this is unfathomable. I can’t imagine what it must be like for someone with real problems like Cancer, Diabetes or heart disease. Ouch.

-enlightener

Shred notes: 6/27/10
Just glad to be shredding. Infection still getting worse. Little white dot showed up in the middle of the swollen part. Playing on grass sucks, but when doing youth outreach, you can’t be picky. Not ideal, but probably less impact on my toe too.

Name: Freedom Footbags
Location: Nampa, Idaho
Website: http://www.freedomfootbags.com

Freedom Footbags will be attending the Boise Rec Fest at Ann Morrison Park this weekend! We’ll have a booth set up and will be offering the majority of the items from our shop. Additionally, on Saturday at 3:00pm we’ll be holding a workshop (they call it a Hacky Sack workshop, but we’ll only have footbags on foot, er hand). We’ll have instruction for players of all levels. For those of you old schoolers that still have VHS players, we’ll have a bunch of free VHS shred video tapes available (while supplies last).

Name: Scott Davidson
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Website: http://footbagfreestyle.blogspot.com/
See all Scott Davidson Posts here!

I have had a videocamera since 1988, thanks to being inspired by Jay Moldenhauer, Greg Nelson, then later Steve Kremer and Josh Casey… also Dennis Jones. I was at the beginning of my footbag career and I saw how Jay was videotaping the finals of events and the sideline shredding as well. They were using it as an effective learning tool and accelerating their footbag game exponentially. It was amazing. I purchased the exact same camera that Jay had, it was a sony hi-8 camera (and I have TONS of footage to convert from the old days, just not enough room to store it, time to do it, or money to buy the thingy that converts it to digital) that served me well for many years. I never get credited with this, but I MADE THE FIRST SHRED VIDEO EVER! I put together the best footage I had of routines and side-shreds and made about fifty copies onto videotapes and I gave them away for free with labels on them that encouraged the recipients to make more copies and give them to their friends. No copyrights, free distribution. I was spreading the word. I still am.

Videotaping has evolved since those days, youtube has made free distribution into a fun pastime. Footbag has gotten more complicated, even faster action and still uses a very small ball that is sometimes hard to see. Here are some tips for making videos of footbag:
1. Get a good camera. HD quality and a wide angle lens is helpful. See comparison of footage between a point and shoot and my new Smartest Phone from a built-in HD video camera (starts with an “i”) below, just released into the wild 2 days ago.
2. Pay attention to lighting. When shooting outdoors in direct sunlight, try to keep the sun behind you. It is better to film on a cloudy day than in direct sunlight because the diffused light that the clouds let through is more evenly distributed across your subjects. If you are shooting indoors there can be many shadows depending on your lighting style. In a conference room, the fluorescent lights provide a good diffused light experience, but sometimes causes a kind of harmonic resonance when the frame rate of the camera exactly matches the flashing-cycle rates of the fluorescent lights, plus for reasons of cleanliness, conference rooms tend to have very busy patterns in the carpeting which make it bad for playing and filming. In a garage, you are going to need lights coming from as many angles as possible to reduce the shadowing, but it can get pretty bad if you only have a few lights. If you have a shadowing problem indoors, try to stay with your back to the best light.
3. Learn to stabilize your shots, limit movement if you don’t have a self-stabilizing camera or use a tripod.
4. Get the right angle for the right shot. Best is a straight on shot from just below hip level with the sun behind you, or good ambient diffused light indoors. I use a lot of upward angles because I don’t have a tripod with me most of the time and I balance the camera on the ground. Angles from above are a nice novelty, but really don’t give a good idea of what is going on.
5. Don’t shoot from too far away. If you use the optical zoom to ‘get closer’, be aware it will amplify any movements you make, so if I had to use optical zoom, I would always recommend a tripod.
6. Turn OFF digital zoom, it is useless. Seriously, turn it off! Now!
7. When I am taping, I keep recording until I get something worth keeping, then I stop and restart the recording. This makes reviewing the footage go MUCH faster because rather than reviewing every second of footage, I go to the end of each clip and trim away everything before it to save space and get rid of unusable footage ASAP.
8. When using a tripod, I find that the mini ones are easy to carry around, but are hard to set up to get the right angle, only because I have to pretty much lay on the ground to see what my image frame is capturing. So for the mini tripods, I prefer to set them up on a pedestal to make it easy to check the frame field. Ideally, a medium size tripod puts the camera at the right height to get a good shot and be easy to set-up. I prefer to set my tripod at about 2 feet high.
9. If you are putting your camera on the ground to film, I suggest a slight upward angle. On my Canon point-and-shoot camera, I use the hand strap under the front of the camera which props it up at the right angle so I don’t see a lot of ground in front of my feet. On my new Phone4, I had to rest it in my extra shirt to angle it back, but I could not see through the viewing side, I had to guess at what my camera was capturing, but it turned out to be useable.
10. Get the right distance from the player. All cameras are different. Think about how you are going to use your footage. If you are doing a static tripod shot, the closer you are to the players the less range the players have to move around in, and you risk losing good footage when players drift out of frame. On the other hand, if you put it too far away, you lose the necessary detail and sometimes can’t see the footbag because it is so small.
11. Choose a solid backdrop when possible. If you have trees, or random objects in the background, the viewers may not be able to see the footbag as it travels across the foreground. So if you are videotaping, and you have any ‘say’ in the process of picking a location, try to find something as close to a solid color for your background.

Comparison of video camera footage for your review:
Canon Powershot SD630 (about 4 years old) with 640×480 frame size 24fps:

Video from my new phone camera which is HD 720p at 30fps (this popular camera phone was released on June 24, 2010):