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Reflections on the 31st Annual NC rope Skipping Workshop

11/11/2020

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Ella W. 
Senior


“Problems are not stop signs, they are guidelines.” - Robert H. Schuller 


This Saturday, November 7th, marked the 31st annual workshop. While Covid restrictions caused changes to the usual routine, persistence and planning allowed the program to continue our tradition while keeping everyone safe and healthy. In true workshop fashion, masters in both single rope and double dutch were brought in to teach five sessions of jumpers.

Our single rope teacher, Stewart Issacs, taught sessions both on speed and freestyle skills. For speed, he explained why having a shorter rope is preferable. Two jumpers demonstrated how with a short length of rope, jumpers can turn the handles faster than with a longer length. Since there is a smaller area to jump inside, jumpers also need to become more compact, bending at the hips with their head down. They also should not move from side to side or front to back within their rope. Through another demonstration, he showed how sometimes slower speed repetitions with fewer misses can increase a jumper’s score, rather than jumping as fast as possible with misses. For the skill sessions, Stewart gave the jumpers their choice for the type of skill, catering to the group in each session. While some chose to work on power skills for the full 30 minutes, others chose multiples or rope leases. His versatility and adaptability based on the group were very impressive to me, and he chose skills which could be modified to be more challenging or broken down easier depending on the skill level.

“Ready your ropes… Judges ready… Jumpers ready… Good luck, begin!” For myself, and many other jumpers, our first experience with the LaToya Gatlin was on the stage of the Apollo theater. Her bubbly personality and sparkling high heels are staples of the Apollo experience. But by learning from LaToya both at the Forbes Flyers workshop and our own this year, I’ve seen her put this same passion and energy into her teaching. In the first session of younger jumpers, LaToya emphasized the importance of rhythm, timing, and communication. She explained the “thumb nose paradigm'' which is a drill where both turners touch their thumbs to the nose as they turn, ensuring that the ropes rotate in a full circle but do not cross. This drill teaches jumpers not to turn pop-ups or at an uneven pace. By keeping a consistent turning rhythm, the jumper also has a beat to follow, keeping the entire group and sync. LaToya is not only a record holding speed jumper, but a fantastic fusion teacher. In the older sessions, she taught many types of dance steps and short stepping routines for jumpers to try. Many of these short routines are double bounce, a fusion skill our team learned in Japan, and while many of the movements in LaToya and Japanese fusion dancing are similar, it was important that our fusion jumpers learn both styles to create future routines combining the two.
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As I sat outside eating a sandwich with Lana, LaToya‘s daughter, I was reminded of what the workshop is really about: coming together and being a part of something bigger than jump rope. Stewart also shared with us the key to his success at both Stanford and MIT: loving what you do and surrounding yourself with people who love it as well. At the end of each of LaToya’s sessions, she had the jumpers repeat the same phrases: “I am great! I am even better with others! I am not the team!” This reminded everyone that without your teammates and community, you can only go so far. Even with fewer alumni than usual, those who were able to attend proved that no matter how long we have spent apart this year, the program will always come together as a family. I am so grateful for everyone who contributed to the success of this year’s workshop, both physically in the gym or virtually. I feel blessed to be a part of a community with such dedication and passion, one that is not afraid to challenge what is possible in the midst of a pandemic and create new “firsts” for both ourselves and our sport.
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My 2020 Workshop Experience

11/10/2020

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Minali J. 
7th Grader


 Every year, we train to get ready for the workshop show. However, for me, the most important and special part of the workshop is when we get the opportunity to jump with and learn from people from other teams. This year, although we did not have the chance to interact so freely, our team went to great lengths to try and make the workshop great for all jumpers on the team. This included inviting two special teachers, LaToya and Stewart, who did a fantastic job at teaching us both single rope and double dutch.

 We started out with single rope, taught by Stewart. My group learned multiple difficult and complex skills, a lot of which were new to me. This included combinations of EK’s and TJ’s, push-ups, crabs, double under frogs, rope releases, and much more. Many of the skills that he taught were learned over his multiple years of training and competing. The fact that he was willing to share his knowledge and help other jumpers from other teams grow, really demonstrated his respect towards our program.

“I am great! I am better with others! I am not the team!” was what LaToya, a jumper from New York, started our double dutch lesson with. This past Saturday, she came to teach us fusion. We learned double step in the form of a two 8-count routine. We had to jump fast and that combined with dance certainly did not make it easy. However, she took us step by step and kept everyone in the same place. LaToya made sure to not only teach us how to execute this routine, but also how to make it look good, how to put energy into your steps, and how to draw the crowd’s attention. That was one thing that she was really good at and one thing that I aspire to improve on as well.

Both of these teachers were chosen for a reason. LaToya and Stewart are both master jumpers and teachers. They have mastered the basics, meaning that they can coach all kinds of skills and all kinds of people. However, we can only benefit from their teaching if we are coachable and go home and practice these skills. If you don’t practice, you can lose the skill just as fast as you get them. We should always take advantage of the opportunities at hand and use them to get better. After all, it’s not every year that something like this happens. Especially in these unusual times, we can only improve, and by taking advice from master teachers, we can do just that!

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