When I’m learning a new trick, I tend to learn it first on one yoyo, whichever one I happen to be liking the most on that day, and then once I feel like I’ve got it mostly under control there, I work on learning it again on (a broad selection of) the other yoyos I have, so that I can do it on monometal / bimetal / plastic / hybrid, fast/slow, heavy/light, wide/narrow, different shapes, different string thicknesses, etc. (not to the extent of trying with 2a/4a/5a setups, mind you, just a bunch of different types of 1a yoyo)
It helps to remind me of the differences between yoyos, so I feel like I’m getting more balanced skills. On the other hand, some tricks are just harder on some yoyos – for example, if a yoyo is easy to bind, bind-related tricks are much easier, but some other will go wrong because it’ll bind up when I don’t want it to. (and vice versa) So at times I feel like I’m just making things difficult for myself when I don’t need to, but on the other hand, if I can get a likes-to-bind yoyo through a complex combo, I’ll have an easier time doing the same thing with a less bind-y yoyo.
Do other people do this sort of “learn it on a bunch of different yoyos to stay flexible” thing, or do you say “I like [this yoyo] the best” and just stick to that one when learning things so that you can really get the hang of that particular yoyo?
imo forcing yourself to use less optimal setups is pointless. i mean to me that’s like training yourself to eat soup with a fork. even if you can, why would you?
now that’s not me saying don’t learn to use other yoyos! but it really depends on what your goal is. I’m just not sure the scenario you’re prepping for. like if you have a yoyo thats good for grinds why would you ever be forced to NOT use it and have to use something else? even in a competition you bring your own yoyos. it’s not like you get handed a yoyo at random and have to use it for better or worse
I’ve never really thought of this before. Usually, like you said I will learn a trick on whatever yoyo I happen to be enjoying at that moment and I often swap my yoyos around quite a bit after I learn the trick. My most balanced yoyo atm is my Terrarian so that’s usually my go-to for new stuff.
I agree, and I often go into tricks using my best throw but sometimes swap to others that I would not consider my best but are fun or a unique challenge.
definitely! thats what i mean by depends what the goal is. to clarify ill use my grind example. say i have 2 yoyos, one is awesome at grinds but the other sucks at it. training yourself to grind on the one that sucks at it may or may not help you learn to grind on the one thats good at it, but you won’t learn more about grinds than you would just using the one that’s good at it. right tool for the job i guess is what I’m saying. and using a less optimal tool I’m just not sure is more valuable than just putting that same time into the right tool
now for the “wonder if i can” times, yes im all in with you on that lol
I swap yoyos constantly tbh. It’s part of the fun for me. I can’t even stick to one a day.
Sometimes if I’m having trouble with a trick I’ll bust out the dino in the wild and usually get it right away. It happened last night. Hour spent trying to get the last bit of the trick a week and then swapped to the diwild and boom, first try.
It feels like cheating, but it’s not good for stuff like chopsticks because it’s ginormous. I know i can do the trick but i want to do it on this 52x39mm throw i just got. idk.
There are lots of tricks that I could only learn because I could try different size and shapes of yo-yos. It’s a huge advantage for learning a trick, but I do try to practice on different size throws once I get the feel for the trick.
I really like the feel of playing on small organic and slim lines - they feel more delightful and alive - and also the experience of focus they bring, but it’s often impossible to learn hard tricks on them. I often start with a yoyo that makes the trick easy - a lot of the times a super stable bimetal that will make slowly learning the trick possible, and let me rehearse the motions clumsily and slowly. I don’t love the feel of the ultra stable yo-yos, but they make learning the trick much easier. And as soon as I can get it I shift to one of my “standard” yo-yos, and once I learn it on I try to get it on, like, a little organic with flat bearings.
For me, they’re almost like different levels of the trick. Level A is get it on the ultra stable big boy. Level B is get it on a standard sized mono. Level 3 is get it on a Panorama or something.
Some days, I just like to hop the same trick between different feeling yo-yos, which I suspect actually slows down learning the trick but… I find it really fun. I dunno. I like adapting a trick slightly to different yo-yos. But I yo-yo in the first place because I’m an easily bored, stimulus-seeking fidgeter, and changing between different yo-yos is apparently the stimulus my mind likes.
I think that’s pretty cool, I haven’t tried too many yoyos so I don’t know what makes a good one and the pro and cons too well. So that’s a great way to fully understand what makes a great one for your own playstyle, imma give it a shot!
The pros literally do this. Gentry would practice on a smaller Shutter because if you can land everything on that, the full size will be easier. I’ve used this mentality before when I used to EDC a Magic Yoyo T8 Shadow. By learning tricks on that yoyo, which was much more narrow, landing the same tricks on anything else was cake.
This might not be an ‘Exact Quote’……. But I have a very good recall of what I’ve heard people say in conversation.
And here is what Steve Brown said on that subject, many years ago.>
Steve said, ‘Don’t tell me you can do a yo-yo trick, until you can do the trick on 5 different yo-yos.
I ‘think’ his reasoning was that each yo-yo offers different performance characteristics. When you ‘wire’ the trick on any particular yo-yo, you have adapted to the advantages and shortcomings of that specific yo-yo.
So, you are almost doing the trick on automatic pilot.
But when you can do the trick on 5 different yo-yos, then that ability to command the yo-yo as necessary, proves you got the trick ‘on Lock’
isn’t that exactly what you’re advocating for? I’m doing exactly what yall are telling me will make me good, minus picking up the wider one after. how is that all of a sudden not optimal? are you aware of anyone in the pro scene besides Gentry who advocates for practicing on a narrow yoyo, especially one who doesnt sell a signature model yoyo in an undersized model? in fact, can you name one pro that trains on a completely different yoyo than the one they’ll compete with?
