The Ultimate Juggling Tricks Challenge is a new juggling competition invented by Scott Cain. A category will be chosen and jugglers from around the world can submit videos (unlisted Youtube videos are preferred) of single juggling tricks (not routines) in that category that they are not aware of anyone else doing and that they believe would be difficult for anyone else to duplicate. To eliminate tricks that were done due to luck, you must show yourself doing the trick three times on the video. This doesn’t mean three angles of the same time getting it, but three separate successful times. The eJuggle staff will chose 10 to 15 of the best submissions and will include them in a followup article. Then the global juggling community has one month to submit their own videos of the same tricks, but it only has to be done one time. You can try to duplicate one trick, all of them, or anything in between. If a trick can not be duplicated, then the juggler who originally submitted it will win the praise of their peers and will be eligible for the monthly prize of a free one year IJA membership, which will be randomly chosen from among all winners that month.
The first challenge was for toss juggling with balls. Here are the entries.
Entry # 1. Juggler: Brian Austin. Description: 446334. The 4’s are thrown as reverse fountain throws. The 6 is thrown as an under arm throw while catching the first 4 under arm. The first 3 is thrown as a reverse backcross and at this point you should start turning your shoulders to catch the second 4 as a penguin. The second 3 is thrown over the opposite shoulder from the from the front to back and then you catch the first 3 behind the back. Right now is when you’re a 180 turn from where you started. The final 4 is thrown as a backcross while catching the last 3 from the same position and keep turning. When you come around, the six and four are caught in their natural hand positions.
Entry # 2. Juggler: Luke Davies. Description: A qualifying run of (ax,8)(8,ax)
Entry # 3. Juggler: Luke Davies. Description: 8 ball half shower – b777 – 8 ball half shower
Entry # 4. Juggler: Florian Maertz. Description: Qualifying run of ([6x6x],[44])*. So basically the 10 ball multiplex version of a (6x,4)*.
Entry # 5. Juggler Daniel Worker. Description: A progression of multi-level showers from 3 to 4 to 5 balls using a kick up to add each additional ball to the pattern. The siteswap for the patterns are: 713151, 915171 and B17191.
Entry # 6. Juggler: Brook Roberts. Description: 4 ball Eric’s extension, followed by one round of 73334 in Eric’s extension, linked directly into 53444 Eric’s extension. A ‘qualify’ of the before and after trick has to be at least 4 sides of both the 4b Eric’s and the 53444 Eric’s, so I think a minimum of 20 catches of 4b Eric’s, 5 catches for the 73334, then 20 catches of 53444 is desired. Both the 7 and all the 5s are thrown with the arms double crossed, thrown by the hand on the bottom – that is, each round of Eric’s contains five throws in a row on the same side, and it’s the last of these five throws on the same side that you throw as the high ball.
Entry # 7. Juggler: Boris Georgiev. Description: This is a 4 ball trick with siteswap ([42x],2x)* done as cross column inverted box. Every beat, there is one ball in the air, and one hand aims a horizontal split close to it. The other throws a 2x over the entire pattern and squeeze catches the ball in the air with one of the balls from the split. The other ball from the split leads into the next beat. 4 beats qualifies the pattern.
Entry # 8. Juggler: Matan Presberg. Description: One round of da741 back to pattern (transition in 89, out 56). Credit Dan Barron for finding this siteswap.
Entry # 9. Juggler: Dan Jahvorsky. Description: The right hand throws the first ball vertically. The left hand then throws with the second ball parallel to the first, about shoulder length apart. The third ball is thrown from right to left under both balls as the left hand throws back to the right hand. Then it is carried extremely quickly counterclockwise in an orbit around the first ball thrown vertically by the right hand—it is then thrown under the left side vertically. The left hand then catches the ball first thrown vertically by the right hand with an immediate throw downward (shuffle) to the right hand. The left hand then catches the first ball thrown vertically by the left hand at the beginning of the pattern with an immediate wrist drop (active two) as the right hand throws the ball it caught under the left side. The falling ball thrown under the left side is then caught under the wrist by the right hand. The pattern restarts with the opposite starting left hand throwing the ball vertically as the right hand throws the ball parallel to it. The third ball is subsequently thrown from left to right under both balls as the right hand throws back to the left hand. It is then carried again extremely quickly in a counterclockwise fashion, in orbit around the first ball of cycle 2 thrown vertically by the left hand—it is then thrown under the right side vertically. The right hand then catches the ball first thrown vertically by the left hand with an immediate throw downward (shuffle) to the left hand. The right hand then catches the first ball thrown vertically by the right hand at the beginning of cycle 2 with an immediate wrist drop (active two) as the left hand throws the ball it caught under the right side. The falling ball thrown under the right side is then caught under the wrist by the left hand. The pattern starts again with the right hand.
Entry # 10. Juggler: Mike Moore. Description: 16 catches of high-low inverted box, with the (2x,2x)s around the 6, rather than below them.
Entry # 11. Juggler: Foppe Coenen. Description: It’s a 7 ball multiplex pattern in which you first do three high throws, then collect 4 balls (2 in each hand). Once you catch them, you immediately throw them up again as a 4 ball multiplex (non-crossing, one hand throws a bit higher than the other). This version adds a 2 stage 720. This is done by throwing two throws of the 3-up higher than usual, then the 3rd one even higher. After that you collect the 4 balls in 2 hands, but this time you throw them way higher than usual. You do a spin right after the the multiplex, underneath all 7 of the balls. Then you catch the first 2 balls of the 3 up, do another spin (therefore a 2 stage 720) and then went back to a normal cascade by catching the 3rd ball of the 3 up, then the 4 balls from the multiplex.
Entry # 12. Juggler: Vincent Mangaud. Description: This is a 3 ball trick where the base pattern is continual neck throw from the right hand. The trick is to pass around theneck to catch 1 ball with the right hand, with the same hand going under the left one, and throw this ball in neck throw. The video will explain and show it more clearly.
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You now have one month to submit videos duplicating any or all of these twelve tricks. Unlike the initial videos, you only have to achieve the trick once on video. Please upload the videos as unlisted youtube videos and email me the links at davidcainjuggler@hotmail.com within a month. Thanks and good luck.
David Cain
David Cain is a professional juggler, juggling historian, and the owner of the world's only juggling museum, the Museum of Juggling History. He is a Guinness world record holder and 16 time IJA gold medalist. In addition to his juggling pursuits, David is a successful composer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and singer as well as the author of twenty-six books. He and his children live in Middletown, OH (USA).