Jump Rope Videos

One of the primary performance venues for jump rope teams is basketball half-time shows. Through the years I performed at too many college games to count and even a few San Antonio Spurs games. If you attend many basketball games, chances are you will eventually see a jump rope demonstration if you haven’t already. Today’s video is of the Bouncing Bulldogs performing at the Duke vs. Maryland Women’s basketball game.

Halftime shows usually only last 4-5 minutes, so they are fast and furious, and contain many different elements of jump rope. For example, in this video the Bulldogs demonstrate the following jump rope styles in this order:

Single Rope Single Freestyle
3 Person Chinese Wheel
Traveler
Double Dutch Single Freestyle
Double Dutch Single Freestyle
Single Rope Pairs Freestyle
single Rope Single Freestyle
Double Dutch Pairs Freestyle
Single Rope Single Freestyle
Traveler

The 2007-2009 USA Jump Rope All Star Team Roster has been officially announced. I’ve reprinted it here in case you missed it. It was an absolute honor for me to get the opportunity to judge the tryouts. The future of our sport looks very bright.

Mary Hunter Benton, Bouncing Bulldogs
Tori Boggs, Jump Company USA
Chris Brown, Heartbeats
Lisa Brown, Heartbeats
Kaylee Couvillion, Heart ‘n Soul
Joe Edney, Bouncing Bulldogs
Mike Fry, Heartbeats
Cara Hassler, Hot Dog USA
Anna Holdaway, Bouncing Bulldogs
Billy Jackson, LA Jazzy Jumpers
Rae Krucoff, Bouncing Bulldogs
Jeremy Lindstrom, Pro Form Airborne
Nikki Lyman, Hot Dog USA
Timothy Martin, Bouncing Bulldogs
Jeffery Mauss, Razz-Ma-Tazz
Courtney McBroom, Hot Dog USA
Colleen McCary, Hot Dog USA
Adam Pang, Heart ‘n Soul
Andrew Pang, Heart ‘n Soul
Lee Reisig, Summerwind Skippers
Scott Simpson, Kangaroo Kids
Lindsey Wallace, One Jump Ahead
Nick Woodard, Razz-Ma-Tazz
Erica Zenn, Bouncing Bulldogs

I tend to think of Jump Rope primarily as a sport. If you’ve had the opportunity to see the U.S. National Jump Rope Championships on ESPN or the new Disney movie, Jump In!, you likely agree with me. It’s easy for me to look at it that way since I’ve grown up with it. However, it’s important to realize that there are many other facets of Jump Rope.

Jump Rope is equal parts competition, cross training, sports entertainment, and performance art. Rene Bibaud was the first person I knew to achieve success in all aspects of Jump Rope. According to her website, “Rene is a five-time world champion, ESPN commentator and former artist and coach of Cirque Du Soleil.”

Here is the ultimate example of jump rope as performance art from Cirque Du Soleil.

It’s great to see that there is a lot of buzz surrounding the Disney movie Jump In! I’m impressed with how well Disney did their homework on the sport. Of course some things had to be somewhat contrived for the sake of the movie, but overall I thought they represented Jump Rope very well.

Even though some of the more advanced moves were performed by stunt doubles, the actors definitely did their share of training before filming started. I’m impressed with what they learned in a relatively short amount of time. In this video Corbin Bleu and Keke Palmer talk a little about the training process.

I jumped for 10 years with the Footnotes Jump Rope Team in San Antonio before going to college at Texas A&M. At Texas A&M I met another guy that used to jump and we decided to form our own college team. In the fall of 1996 we started the Texas A&M Jump Rope Team and recruited some of our friends and taught them to jump. Some of our jumpers had never picked up a rope before joining our team. I’m very proud of what those guys learned to do in just a couple of years.

I believe our team was the first college jump rope team. Certainly there were jumpers before me that continued to jump in their college years, but usually with the same teams they jumped with before college. I think ours was the first actual college team. We practiced hard, did a few shows around town, and even managed to make it to nationals a few times.

As I said before, I used to be able to jump. Well, here’s the proof that I could actually get off the ground once upon a time. This is the double dutch routine that we spent the majority of our time working on.

Labels: Double Dutch, Freestyle, Jump Rope, Video

The Heartbeats are one of the best known jump rope teams in the world. The team was founded in 1992. By the time the U.S. Nationals started in 1996, the team was ready to shine. I seem to remember them doing very well during the years I was at Nationals (’96-’01). They’ve also had a lot of success in the AAU Junior Olympics. According to their website they’ve captured numerous individual and team medals along with the Team Show trophy at both the USA Jump Rope Nationals and the AAU Junior Olympics.

Here is a video of their team show performance that earned them 2nd place at the 2006 Worlds in Toronto, Canada.

The new Disney movie Jump In may be the most exciting thing to happen in Jump Rope since the U.S. Nationals began airing on ESPN in 1996. The entire Jump Rope community is buzzing with the attention that this movie has brought to our sport. According the The Houston Chronicle, the original airing of Jump In had 8.17 million viewers, which makes it the most watched program in Disney history. As a result, interest in the sport of Jump Rope has skyrocketed in recent months.

Corbin Bleu, the star of Jump In, appeared on Live with Regis and Kelly in early January to promote the movie. The impressive thing is that he learned to do his own jumping for the movie in a relatively short time. He demonstrated some of his new skills for Regis and Kelly.

Tori Boggs is one of jump rope’s youngest and brightest stars. Tori is a member of the USA Jump Rope All Star team. She currently holds the U.S. national records for 1-minute single rope speed and 3-minute single rope speed. Her 1-minute speed record is an amazing 359. That’s nearly 6 jumps a second for an entire minute. I think my fastest speed score ever was 284. A mere 4.7 jumps a second. The girl is fast.

Not only is she good at speed, she’s also got a great single rope freestyle routine. See for yourself…

This is some of the best choreography I’ve ever seen in a double dutch routine. It’s an excellent routine, but I wish they would have landed the basket toss inside the ropes rather than doing it completely outside of the ropes. It would have been very easy for them to do.

Here’s more video from the 2006 USA Jump Rope All Star team.