Random Ah Ha - More efficient way to sweep across body

Today I came across a way to help control my balance a bit better when quickly moving the stick from one side to the other. Its especially useful when the ball in in close.

If I have the stick out in front of me (see earlier past) and tried to swing it quickly from one side to the other, the large arc that it sweeps out and the distance that the stick must be out in front to get past my body made for slow movement, often led to me stabbing myself in the stomach as I passed and caused the unicycle to twist in the opposite direction due to the large radii.

The thing I found today was that instead of sweeping a big arc with the stick extended out it was a bit more effective if I drew the stick back and around my side (retracting back past my hip) and then when it fully 'retracted' push it forward while continuing to rotate it with the lower hand. In this way the blade tracks along a straighter path rather than a large arc which seems to results in less twisting of the uni to counteract the sweep due the action being dominated pulling and pushing action rather than upper body twisting which naturally needs the uni to counteract it.

A key to making this comfortable is to make sure the lower hand slides along the stick so that it can remain at a good distance from you body when the stick is retracted. This also help give better control and accuracy to the stick placement.

Update:

This retracting to the side seems to be valuable in avoiding the feeling of being cramped up when handling the ball in close. I used it when trying to dribble the ball from left to right and it felt like there was a lot more control and speed in the movement.

Update:

I tried using this approach when handling the ball through a series of cones. I was suprised at just how much counter-twisting this action still resulted in. As a result I found it very difficult to guide my way through a slalom course of cones because when I turned the wheel to go around a cone and then reached for the ball and pulled it in the pulling action changed my course. I think I need to twist away from the ball just prior to pulling it in or start the pulling action by keeping my arms fixed and using a deliberate turning of the uni to start the action of pulling the ball in. Which ever there needs to be some counter rotation before the ball gets pulled in with this approach.

Better twitch and close game

My wife found a Reaction Ball at our local sports store and so today I had a chance to try it out.

I hadn't heard of them before I recently spotted one in a Rebel Sports catalog. Apparently they are for cricket practice and help improve reaction time to off bounces. The large nodes on the side means that it bounces in an unpredictable way. This turned out to be fun and useful on the unicycle as it meant that I needed to find a posture and balance that would let me react quickly to the bounce.

I just randomly stick handled it around close to me trying to move it left,right, behind, ahead, dribble etc and every now and then gave it a hit to clear it out to a new area. Was a great work out - legs were on fire after 5 minutes. I have a feeling this is going to be a very valuable little addition. I haven't tried it against a wall yet, but that should take it up a level.

Stick handling - random Ah Ha moment

Stumbled on a way to manage my balance better when sweeping the stick quickly from one side to the other. Here is a top down view of the stick and the Blue Straw Man.

By holding the stick out in front and attempting to pivot the stick about an imaginary point mid way between my hands two good things happened:

1. Both hands are engaged and apply force so both arms are creating the drive
2. The motion is largely symmetrical so it has less impact on balance than twisting your upper body to move the stick.

I think this might be a useful method when controlling the ball left to right, reaching quickly to get the ball when you're wrong footed, or trying to create the largest obstruction you can to a players path. The flip side is that your body posture doesn't change much so there is no faking value to it. i.e In a fake the player might drop a shoulder to make the opponent think they are heading in one direction and then quickly turn the opposite way to wrong foot the opponent. Here the player's body is being used to broadcast a confusing message about their intention. In the above stick handling approach the line you're riding and your posture can't really be used to broadcast. For this reason I think this approach might be better used in defensive moves where (it seems to me) quick reflexes to follow the opponents lead is more important. In offensive moves I suspect this move will leave the ball too far away from you to really feel in control of it.

Update: Keeping the lower hand fixed and doing all the work with the upper hand works well, if not better for controlling and avoiding going off balance. It does trade of some power but it gains in control and balance. Has good success in dribbling the ball at a good speed using the fixed lower hand. 

Stickhandling

Stick handling in unicycle hockey take most of its  direction from ice hockey and there is loads of great resources around on how to do it. www.howtohockey.com is a favourite.

I am very much a novice on this front and still find (after 3 sessions:)) that the hockey stick still puts be off balance when I try to handle it with my dominate hand at the top. However, today I discovered a few micro-things that seemed to improve my handling.

i) The top hand should be doing 95% of the work so if that arm is not fatiguing then the other hand is probably doing to much work.

ii) Cupping the ball, meaning that the face of the stick is not vertical when its in contact with the ball but instead leans in towards it, seems to be a very solid way to keep the ball from hitting and jumping over the stick. By focusing on cupping it I found that I lost control far far few times.

iii) Cupping is achieved largely through the rolling of the wrist of the hand on the top of the stick. I spent 20 mins just practicing this rolling motion as I pushed the ball from the left to right and back. The mental framing I found useful was to have my lower hand (in my case the left hand) pointing at the ball. There was almost a sense that the lower hand was fixed at a point in space relative to my body and the upper hand was doing all the positioning and exaggerated wrist rolling was responsible for the cupping.


iv) When moving the ball left and right the cupping action results in an action that makes me think of spreading butter on bread using one side of the knife then the the other, back and forth.

v) I tried to minimise the amount that I bent at the hips in order to reach for the ball. In the first instance I tried to recover the ball by letting the stick slip through you lower hands grip (like drawing a pool cue). Only if it was beyond reach did I then lean into it. I think that anything that prevents a chance of balance is a good thing.

The drills I ran through today that seemed to help:

i) Put the unicycle away and just walk around with the ball practicing the lower hand pointing and wrist rolling. Practice with the ball in different places around you. Walk very slowly.
ii) Try different motions of the ball: push it forward and then use the back of the stick to bring it back in, push it from the close on the left to far on the right. Avoid bending at the hips to reach out for the ball. In the first instance use your upper hand to push the stick towards the ball and let the stick slip through your hand as if making a shot with a pool cue.
iii) Increase these speed slightly to a brisk walk and then work up to a job. keep handling the ball in different locations around your body.

The main idea of these drills was to get used to cupping by rolling the wrists and to reach for the ball with the stick slipping through you lower hand (and avoiding leaning forward if possible).

Adding increasing speed, which then starts to feel more like the real action, will require you to adjust how you push and pull the ball because of the net forward speed.

I did these for about a 1/2 hour and then got on the unicycle and tried and there was a notice improvement in the length of time I could keep the ball under control when dribbling is straight lines and fairly big arcs.

I haven't done any work on controlling the ball through sharp turns yet but that is coming up soon.