Back flip technique

The following is a response to one of my videos on YouTube. I found it fascinating and very informative. Hopefully you will also...

Matt,

Love your channel! I am 36 years old and played all sports growing up but after building a business, getting married, having kids and being heavily involved in church ministry I got away from a regular fitness rutine. This along with bad diet and over working at a physical job My back gave out and I was in bed for a week and could not stand up straight. I evaluated my priorities or really put more emphasis on areas that where lacking attention.

I stopped working out because I did not have time in my schedule, so I had to design a workout that would still inspire me as a hard core worout, but take minimal time. I also wanted a workout that would not have the goal of looking pretty but develop real usable core strength and endurance. Stuff that can be used in real every day life. So I made a list of single exersizes that would focus on strengthening all the major muscle groups and work them in a circuit to develop endurance as well as strength.

I looked on you tube for some ideas and stumbled across your videos. Just what I needed! Along with a few other resources I now have the workout I have wanted my whole life but never knew existed. I just wanted to say thanks for the excellence of what you do!

Also I wanted to return the favor and through you a tip that I think you will enjoy. Please keep in mind I am not giving you this tip out of pride or criticism. I can't stand that! I only comment so I can give back and in some small way return the favor.

I noticed in your workouts you do some gymnastics moves. The one I noticed was the back flip. I used to coach gymnastics so this is my department. I noticed your technique was off. Not that this is any big deal if you only want to do back flips, but you strike me as the type of guy that you always challenge yourself and try to improve, taking things to the next level. If you correct your technique with your vertical jump you could do more than back flips wich would increase the intensity of the flips increasing the results of the exersize.

If you watch your video you will notice when you start your back flip the first thing you do is through your head back as you jump and then you tuck your knees around as fast as you can bringing them around and back underneath you. This technique is a natural response to your bodies defense mechanism to want to know where you are at all times relative to the floor. Its like a cat that always wants to land on its feet. This technique however kills your ability to gain heighth on your back flip wich is necessary for doing more than just one tuck flip befor you land on the floor. You have to retrain your mind and your badies natural instinked. You have to learn to use your senses to identify where you are at in the air relative to the ground.

The proper technique is to: At the atart of the back flip instead of thraoughing your head back to whip your body around jump straight up reching your hands as high as you can (try to touch the ceiling). Keep in mind there is two parts to the back flip 1.the jump giving you height that buys you the time to flip around befor you hit the floor and 2. the spin or flip in the air the speed of which will also determine how many rotations or other tricks you can do befor you hit the floor. Your flip, even though you jump hard, is focused on the spin because through your head back detirmines the direction the force of your jump is applied. If you whip it back you are jumping back not up, so mo matter how hard you jump you will never go any higher.

Start developing your jump straight up to direct the force up. Stretch your arms straigth and keep your head facing forward as long as you can until you reach the heighth of your jump and then flip. Remember the higher you are the more time you have to spinaround and get back to the floor. This will take alot of practice. On your spin ot flip part instead of whiping your head back to generate your spin at the height of your jump pull your knees up over the top of your head and keep your head facing forward. Do not use your head for the rotation. Use your knees. This will give you full height in your jump and when you tuck your knees up over your head you will tuck up over the height of jump rather than droping your flip by whiping your head back and down.

Employ this technique properly with your vertical leap and you will find that your flips will be 2-3 times as high and you will have so much time in the air you can start trying to do other tricks in the air or add a spin to your flip or even another flip befor your feet hit the ground. This would increase the intenstiy of your workout.

I hope that helps sorry for the length but proper technique requires detailed instruction. Let me know if you have any other gymnastic questions such as strength moves or tecchnique. I will help if I can.
Thank you again for your skills.

Travis McGhee