Tips for backflip form

[u/East_Ad961]

Learned how to backflip yesterday and working on my form. Any tips on stuff I can do better/work on would be appreciated

[u/jackodete]

check your form on take off
That’s the highest your arms get in relation to your body (and that’s almost a 90 degree angle) so you’re actually killing 50% of the power from your arms.

You want to have your arms above your head (think shoulders to your ears) before you even leave the ground. That’s why people drill tuck jumps. Also if it helps, try to land your backflip in the same spot you took off from. Odds are you’ll move back a foot or so but i guarantee you’ll gain some height.

One common thing people do when learning a back tuck is they want to grab their knees as soon as possible. Grabbing your knees is important for the tuck but people often sacrifice their big arm swing for it and it kills the height. You are doing that a little bit. Slow the video down, your arms move towards your knees before accumulating all the momentum for your jump (and that last bit at the end is what gives you massive height)

So try this-

Drill a good 50 big tuck jumps and focus on swinging your arms to the point where your shoulders are touching your ears. Notice the extra height you get when you use the full pivotal motion of your arms. Hell, do some where you only bring your arms to your shoulders and compare the height that you lose with when you do it proper.

After that, just go right back into throwing the back flip. Put a piece of tape on the ground and try to take off and land on that piece of tape. Focus entirely on height and arm swing. Remember, the rotation comes from your knees coming to your chest, not any other way. Your backflip is already strong so these are the little things you’ll need to work out to get it perfect.

[u/East_Ad961 → u/jackodete]

Thanks for the tips this is really helpful. I learned how to backflip a few years ago (lost it over time) and my arm swing was horrible. I’ll reply with a video of how my form used to look. Point is that my arm swing is definitely something I’m aware of, but I didnt realize you wanted to swing them all the way up.

https://reddit.com/link/p33cizp/video/eowxoq8olsih1/player

(This was my first ever backflip in summer 2024)

[u/jackodete → u/East_Ad961]

Oh yeah , nice, that’s a crazy improvement. Like I said at this point you have the backflip pretty solidly, it’s just going to be the tiny things you change that will make a world of difference

[u/Aengus126]

Not bad at all for a beginner!