I've become obsessed with standing fulls. I used to do them when I was 19, but never was consistent with them, took 2 years off acrobatics, been training 2 years again now and want to master standing fulls! I'm talking about traditional style, not arabian half/Russian style. Here's some notes I've taken analyzing my approach. If anyone would be kind enough to read and offer their input, that'd be great! I can shoot and post a video up in a few days so you can get an even better idea of where I'm at.
Looking
- I'm looking at a point slightly above eye level and try to keep my eyes locked on this point until I reach the peak of my jump.
Stance
- An organic, near shoulder width stance. Some prefer feet together for an aesthetic purpose and for more specific application to tumbling, but I find it ultimately unnecessary.
Arms
- My arms start bent, neither straight in front nor completely overhead. I find that completely overhead makes the whole swinging then jumping process feel too slow and less explosive, though I'm not positive my arm usage is optimal.
- I try to extend my arms all the way straight as I reach the peak of my jump, after which I quickly wrap them tight slight to the side of my chest that I'm twisting on. I've heard that wrapping the arms lower towards the waist/hips can produce a faster twist but at the cost of a more crooked landing. I'm not positive about this.
Legs
- I only semi-squat, don't reach parallel, perhaps if I squatted lower I could get more height, but it feels slower and more awkward, I'm not sure if it's worth retraining with a lower squat with a slower take off is better or if a faster take off is actually preferrable.
- My legs come together as soon as I get in the air. They come apart just before landing.
- I only use a slight bend of my legs to get around. I find trying to keep my legs locked straight feels impossible to get myself to get around, and tucking too much feels awkward. Not sure if locked legs is possible (excluding the arabian half/Russian style) and just need more practice and I'm not sure if getting a tight tuck can make it easier on myself if I were to spend more time practicing it.
Distance
- I tend to land slightly behind from where I started. I'm assuming that's natural?
Other notes
- I've had a tendency to jump slightly backward rather than straight up, not sure how this started. It might have initially started by focusing on "opening my chest", I'd try to open my chest from the start which would cause me to go back. I'm trying to fix this bad habit but I'm also wondering how can you tell if you're doing an efficient job opening your chest, can you feel it somewhere, should it be felt like an arch in your upper back or what?