This trick is called Man on the Flying Trapeze, and it looks like this:
Now most likely, Man on the Flying Trapeze is the first string trick that you are going
to be learning.
A string trick is just a trick where the yoyo lands on the string.
Almost certainly it is going to be the first trick that you learn using the breakaway throw.
Now if you have tried learning this throw you probably already know it can be a little
bit tricky to get it to go straight, to keep the yoyo from leaning while you throw it,
to get powerful enough.
So we recommend while you are learning that throw, you might as well be learning another
trick to go along with it.
And that trick is the Man on the Flying Trapeze.
The first time you manage to land trapeze, chances are you are going to get yourself
into some trouble.
Most likely, this is going to happen.
There is a couple of reasons why that is going to happen the first time that you land the
trapeze.
I want to address those before we actually get into teaching the trick.
Just so that you can have a little bit more confidence when you get into it.
Chances are the reason why that is happening, first and foremost, is because your breakaway
is not all that powerful yet.
What you will find is that the stronger you throw your breakaway, the more likely the
yoyo is to resist leaning.
That is going to make the trick a lot easier to learn at first.
Make sure you are really working on that.
The second thing is, when this happens, it could lead you to believe that there is something
wrong with your yoyo, like it is not really able to sleep all that long while it is on
the string.
But the truth is that once your yoyo is on the string, it should be able to sleep just
as long on the string as it does off the string.
The reason why it does not sleep as long sometimes is because the string is actually pushing
into the side of the yoyo.
That will cause it to lean.
The friction will actually kill the spin time.
In this video, I am going to give you a whole bunch of tips that will help you manage all
of those things, just keep those in mind as you are first learning and that will help
keep you from getting frustrated.
When you first learn this trick, what you want to do is take you opposite hand and your
first finger, and just set it right here.
You do not want to move it while you do the trick because it is going to limit some of
the factors involved in this trick, which will make it easier to land it at first.
Once you have got this set up, you are going to want to throw your breakaway.
As soon as the string touches this first finger, you are going to take your yoyo hand.
Move it away and then bring it right back towards your first finger after the yoyo lands
on the string.
Just like that.
The reason why you want to pull away is because that is going to accelerate the motion of
the yoyo as it goes around your finger.
That is going to make it easier to land on the string.
But if you continue to pull your hand away as the yoyo hits the string, watch what happens.
It just bounces right back off.
So what you need to do instead is right as the yoyo is landing onto the string, then
you bring your hands together.
That will cushion the yoyo on the string.
It will actually help you keep the strings more aligned as well.
So it is just a good idea to get in that habit.
It will also set you up for the swinging part of the trapeze, which is what the trick is
named for if you decide to do that part of the trick.
One tip that I can give you right up front is that it is going to be a lot easier to
land the yoyo on the string if you make sure to land it as close to your finger as possible,
of course without hitting your finger.
That just limits how far the yoyo can be away from the string, which is going to make it
a lot more accurate.
You can technically land the yoyo anywhere along the length of the string, but the further
away you get from your finger, it is going to be a lot harder to aim, which of course
is going to make that part of the trick a lot harder to do.
So it is just easier if you land it really close to your finger when you get started.
Chances are when you are first learning this trick, your breakaway is not going to be perfectly
straight, so the yoyo is going to land on the string crooked.
But actually that is totally ok, because you can adjust the tilt of the yoyo while it is
on the string in a way that is really simple.
Even if you land the yoyo a little bit crooked like this, all you need to do is, if it is
leaning in towards you, just pull in your yoyo hand toward you, and that corrects the
lean and forces it outwards.
If the yoyo is leaning away from you, you do the opposite, push your yoyo hand out a
little bit.
That will bring the tilt of the yoyo back in towards you.
It is really just that simple.
That is why it is a good idea to practice the trapeze and the breakaway at the same
time.
Even if you land it crooked, you can straighten it out and then you can continue on with other
tricks.
This also plays into a tip that we mentioned earlier, which is once you get it onto the
string, you want to bring your hands together a little bit.
The reason you want to do that is if it is a little bit crooked and you keep your hands
spread apart, that is going to exaggerate how quickly the yoyo is going to lean and
that will not give you quite as much time to correct the tilt.
It is a good idea to just cushion the yoyo a little bit when it lands on the string by
bringing your hands together.
Now the last thing that I am going to show you is what happens if you miss the string.
There is two techniques that we can use to get the yoyo back onto the string.
The first one is if you miss and the yoyo passes on the outside of the string.
If the string coming off the yoyo is in front of this string, all you need to do is curl
this finger downward which will hook this string.
This string will drop off of this first finger.
Then you are going to put your three fingers right onto the string.
You can toss the yoyo right back onto the string.
Just like that.
When you miss with the yoyo on the inside of the string, all you need to do is turn
your hand over.
Hook the string just like this.
Then you can extend your three fingers underneath the yoyo.
It is just like your setup before, you can use those fingers to toss the yoyo right back
onto the string.
One thing that may or may not be obvious at this point is that if you are consistently
missing with the yoyo missing on the outside of the string, and you have been keeping your
opposite hand still as you do the trick, that means that you are holding your yoyo hand
too close to your body as you do the trick.
So it is not lined up with the yoyo as it is coming across.
So the way you correct that is just extend your yoyo hand out a little bit further and
you will find that your accuracy will start to go up.
Same thing is true if the yoyo is consistently missing to the inside of the string.
Chances are you are extending your yoyo hand too far away from your body.
That is why you consistently miss that way.
So again you just want to find that right balance and you can adjust your aim with where
your yoyo hand is as you land the yoyo onto the string.
This last part of the video is only going to apply to some of you.
It is to address this problem, you have learned how to do the trapeze, but then when you pop
the yoyo off the string, you are wondering “how come my yoyo did not come back?”
Chances are if that is happening to you, it is because you have gotten what is called
an unresponsive yoyo, which is designed to not come back up unless you perform a trick
called a bind.
There is actually a whole lot of different binds, and they are kind of tricks in their
own right, but in this video I just want to teach you a really simple on that pairs really
well with the trapeze that will give you a nice smooth flow to the trick, if you do have
an unresponsive yoyo.
To do this, what you are going to do is start with the trapeze and then extend your middle
finger on your opposite hand.
Just pop the yoyo right over your middle finger so the string is just hanging on it just like
that.
Then you are going to swing the yoyo over, just above your yoyo finger and put the yoyo
right onto the string.
Then to execute the bind, all you want to do is pinch the string on your middle finger
of your opposite hand.
Change the height of your hands and you can see that the yoyo comes right back.
This is just one bind that you can do from the trapeze.
We have other videos that teach you other binds.
We also have a few introductory bind videos that will address how this work, why it works,
and will also address some of the problems you may run into when learning binds.
You definitely want to check those out.
This is just a really nice bind to get you started that is not too difficult to learn
when you are learning the trapeze.
We hope that all of these techniques help you get your Man on the Flying Trapeze down,
and as you practice that you will naturally find that your breakaway will get a lot straighter
and a lot more powerful.
These are gateways into a whole lot of really awesome tricks.
So that is the Man on the Flying Trapeze.