Mastering the Backflip Safely: A Comprehensive Guide

The backflip, also known as a back tuck, somi, or salto, is an impressive display of flexibility and agility. However, it's an advanced skill that requires careful preparation and practice. Whether you're a kid or an adult, learning to backflip can be a rewarding experience. This guide provides a step-by-step approach to learning a backflip safely, covering everything from basic exercises to advanced techniques.

Preparing Your Body

Before attempting a backflip, it's crucial to prepare your body with a thorough warm-up and stretching routine. This helps prevent injuries and improves your overall performance.

Warm-up

Begin with a 25-minute cardio warm-up to increase blood flow and loosen your muscles. Trampolining is a great way to get fit and healthy, and it can be a fantastic warm-up for practicing backflips.

Stretching

After your cardio warm-up, perform a series of stretches targeting your arms, legs, chest, and back.

Forward Bend: Stand straight with your feet together, then bend slowly down toward the floor. This stretches your hamstrings and back muscles.
Arm Stretch: Bring one arm up over your head, reaching toward the sky. Bend your arm at your elbow so it’s parallel to the back of your head. Then, use your other hand to pull your elbow gently toward your head. This stretches your shoulder and triceps muscles.

Always warm up your muscles for 2-5 minutes before doing stretches.

Read also: Learn Forex Trading

Building a Foundation

Before attempting a full backflip, it's essential to master some basic gymnastics skills and build a solid foundation.

Basic Gymnastics Skills

It’s best to learn basic gymnastics skills, such as cartwheels and backwards rolls, before you try to do a backflip.

Back Rolls

The back flip starts with getting comfortable doing back rolls. As mentioned, the first step on your backflip journey is the back roll. These help us in getting comfy with rotations. So, what you do is, rolling backwards, you pull your knees towards your chest. You can also angle your head to the side at the beginning to make it easier to roll backwards. Throw your arms up, keep your core tight, and throw your knees backwards. When you do it with momentum it goes sort of like an actual backflip, just laying down. If you want to make it more challenging, you can start with your arms already extended. Straightening your legs can help get over the sticking point.

Standing Back Rolls

To get closer to an actual backflip from here, the next step is to start in a standing position and to do the same back roll from that standing position.

Elevated Back Rolls

As you get the hang of rolling on the ground, you want to get further up on the ground. This leads us to elevated back rolls. For elevated back rolls, you can use any elevated surface, such as your bed, a box or a chair. When using a partner, make sure their hips are shoulder height. One common mistake when trying the elevated back roll is to forget to use legs to create rotation. Once you get comfortable with a partner-assisted elevated back roll, you can try with the partner’s body facing perpendicular to yours, so that you have less surface of their back to roll on. Again, you can use your bed, bars, rings, a sofa, or anything else that serves as an elevated surface to ‘get your reps in’ and start getting used to rolling backwards. It’s worth mentioning again: the most common reason for backflip failure is freezing/fear. The best way to make sure this doesn’t happen is to get comfortable rolling backwards, and comfort rolling backwards is established by repetition. The more you practice, the more you get used to it, the more you prevent injury.

Read also: Understanding the Heart

Back to Back Rollover

Here is another back rolling drill to get comfortable turning around backwards: the back to back rollover. For this drill, the person who is doing the rolling, as well as the partner, are both active. The partner needs to help by pulling the roller over their back and crunching forward.

Macaco

A macaco is basically a back handspring, where you’re starting with one hand already on the floor First, you need to choose which side is more comfortable for putting your hand down on the ground. What you want to do is start with one hand on the ground, throw your other arm up and jump backwards over the hand that is planted on the ground. One way to train for the macaco is to ‘circle your hand’. The very first step is just to run around your hand, from the start position to the final position. Then make a small jump, each time further and further, in a circle, around your planted hand. The bigger the jump you try to do, the more of an arm swing you will need from your free hand. Eventually you want to swing your arm straight backwards, which will give you the “full” macaco. To build from the macaco towards a back handspring and eventually the backflip, you want to try to perform the macaco without the planted hand down yet. So, you’ll jump into the macaco and then put your hand down. Try to bring the macaco more and more vertical, so you are getting nearer and nearer to the look and feel of an actual backflip.

Trampoline Backflips

A trampoline is an excellent tool for learning and practicing backflips safely. It provides a soft landing surface and allows you to focus on the technique without the fear of a hard fall.

Pullover

Before you start practicing those backflips, learn to do the Pullover on a trampoline first. If you know how to do the Pullover, then you should know how to do this step. You can start with smaller bounces and slowly increase the height of the jump. Looking up while falling down will give you a confidence boost. Do the same thing as on step 1, but this time do it with a tuck. In other words, while jumping on your back, grab your legs in the air. Keep praticing for at least 20 minutes and use your arms as they’ll help with rotation. Pullovers have a similar feeling to how backflip on a trampoline feels.

Attempting the Backflip

Once you feel confident to advance from pullovers, it is time to, as they say, just do it. As Markku suggests in the tutorial video, it is a good idea to utilize a mat so that it feels less scary. A perfect option for that is our small crash mat designed for trampoline tricking. However, you can also practice the backflip without the mat, too. Focus on doing the flip rather than landing perfectly during this step. The most important thing when doing a backflip is that you cannot hesitate mid-air to avoid hurting yourself. Once you decide to do it, go for it 100%. Once you can do the backflip, keep practicing the landing. Practising trampoline tricks takes time. Enjoy the process and don’t feel discouraged if you are not able to master the trampoline backflip immediately. If you have a friend who already knows how to do the trick, it is always a good idea to have them to support and guide you. At ACON, we supply various trampoline sizes, particularly those suitable for mastering the backflip and other tricks. Besides the pullover and backflip, the possibilities are endless when it comes to learning tricks on ACON trampoline. Watch our tutorials on Ballout, Double Flips, Kaboom, and many more tricks on our YouTube Channel.

Read also: Guide to Female Sexual Wellness

The Backflip Technique

Once you're ready to attempt a backflip, focus on the following key elements:

Starting Position

Keep your back straight and neck straight, with your gaze directed forward. This will help you keep your head facing forward in a neutral position. It doesn’t matter what you look at or if you can see it in detail.

The Squat

Sit back as you bend at your knees, keeping your back straight. Don’t bend too deeply. If you’re bending like you would for a normal squat, you’re bending too much. Similarly, don’t bend too far forward, as this will throw off your balance.

The Jump

Extend your arms in a straight line, but don’t lock your elbows. Make a backward arc with your arms to help propel yourself backwards as you jump high into the air. You should be jumping upwards, not backwards. Even though you’re flipping backwards, you need to jump up into the air to get the momentum you need for a backflip.

The Tuck

Your chest should be about parallel with the sky (or ceiling) when you pull in your knees. Bring your arms back in toward your legs as you tuck. If you feel yourself turning to the side as you tuck, this is caused by a rear reflex. You likely need to do more conditioning exercises, such as jumps and stretches. Tucking your knees is an important part of a backflip because it gives you the momentum you need to complete the flip.

Spotting the Landing

As you flip, try to spot the object in the distance that you were staring at before you began your jump. This can help you time your landing. It’s okay if you don’t see the object you were staring at before.

Landing

Release your tuck and extend your legs outward. A slight bend is all you need to properly stick your landing. Don’t bend too far down, as you could lose your balance. Your body will be nearly in a straight line as your feet hit the floor, aside from the slight bend in your knees. You’ll be in a near-standing position when you land, but your chest will likely be tilted forward. If you feel like you are falling forward when you land, it’s okay to reach forward to try to steady yourself with your hands.

Partner-Assisted Backflips

If you’re with a partner, there are a couple ways you could start to work on the actual backflip. The very first one is having your spotter lock his hands around your waist and lifting you, the flipper or practitioner. To build some trust with your partner you can try this simple drill where you lock your arms around their body and help them flip around.

T-Shirt Drill

Another way to practice is what Theo and I call the “T shirt drill” For this one, the spotter wraps their hand all the way into the t-shirt of the flipper and makes sure it’s tight. One important thing to keep in mind as the flipper/practitioner - if you want to continue to have a spotter - is to swing your arms in a straight line backwards, and not out to the side. Why? WRONG! Your spotter is your friend - don’t hit them in the face! So, at the beginning, it might be best for the practitioner to actually start with their hands already up with each arm near to the ears, to be 100% sure you will not hit your spotter in the face. Then, as you practice more and get used to keeping your arms straight and near to your head, you can switch to starting with them by your sides and incorporating the full arm swing. The spotter, who will have their hand wrapped in the practitioner’s shirt, can use their free hand to support the practitioner. The spotter may put their hand/arm in the hamstring area of the practitioner. The next step after this is to take off your shirt - woohoo! - and start to try the backflip with slightly less support, albeit still with a spotter. Now, for the spotter, the hand that was wrapped in the flipper’s t-shirt will now be placed on the lower back. It is important to note that the hand placed on the lower back is not meant to be there for static support only, but should also be used to help lift the flipper after they’ve jumped, to give them more time to complete their rotation.

Practice and Progression

Practicing trampoline tricks takes time. Enjoy the process and don’t feel discouraged if you are not able to master the trampoline backflip immediately.

Soft Surfaces

When all of the above is something you’ve become comfortable with, it is time to really start practicing backflips! The safest way to do this is on a soft surface, like sand, mattresses, a foam pit, or a pool! When you’re ready to start practicing actual backflips, find a soft surface, like a pool!

Commitment

COMMITMENT IS EVERYTHING! The worst falls are people who back out because they're scared. If you decide to do it you need to fucking DO IT. Peoples reaction is to not huck it hard and back out, or to turn to the side, that's how you get hurt. It's weird. The easiest way to get hurt is to be scared of getting hurt and try to get out safely. If you huck the thing legit there is like a %95 percent chance of coming close to landing it. You might even land the first one. It's common for people to overotate the first one. As long as it's not by a ton or on a huge jump that's not bad.

Spotting

If you have a friend who already knows how to do the trick, it is always a good idea to have them to support and guide you.

Additional Tips

Improve your vertical jump: Improving your vertical jump will make learning the backflip easier. Get your vertical jump game strong to help your backflip progress!
Strengthen your core: Strengthening your core will also make learning the backflip easier. Part of the backflip is tucking your legs in, and to do that, you use your core. So exercises which strengthen your core, such as hanging leg raises, will help.
Imagine yourself succeeding: Imagine yourself doing it beforehand and succeeding.
Don't throw your head back: Do NOT throw your head back. Try to keep it neutral (the position it would be in if you were looking forwards).
Practice on a bed: Practice by lying on your back on your bed, with your head hanging over the edge. Then, slide forward off the bed, catching yourself on the floor with your hands. Boost your legs up and over your head.

Common Mistakes

Stopping with your arms before you reach the top of your arm swing
Starting to flip before you finish the jump. You should try to get tall and stretch out at the top of your jump, with your arms extended, and really start your flip, before you tuck. If you don’t, you won’t get any rotation. To eliminate the chance of this happening at the beginning, you can try the backflip with your hands already raised.

Safety Considerations

Since a backflip is an advanced move, it can be dangerous to complete, especially at first. At the very least, make sure someone is with you to call for help if you get hurt. It can also help to practice on a trampoline before you try a standing back tuck on the floor.

You need to be on a soft surface to minimize your risk of injury. As another option, you may prefer starting on flat ground, which provides some give and helps you build momentum.
If you’re doing a backflip from a diving board, give yourself adequate clearance so that you don't strike your head on the board. Also, make sure that the water is deep enough so that you don't hit your head on the bottom of the pool.

tags: #how #to #do #a #backflip #safely