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Hi. My name is Natalie McFancy Wise, I’ve been hula hooping for three and a half years. I have a degree in dance from the University of Missouri at Kansas City Conservatory of Music and Dance. I’ve focused in choreography and also modern technique. And I’m now living in the New York city area as a hula hoop artist and fire performer.

The great thing about hula hooping is that everyone loves it. There’s not one person you will find who says, “I hate hula hooping. I hate doing it. I hate watching it.” There’s nobody that ever says that. It’s easy for kids up to seniors to participate in hula hooping and it makes you feel good.

I started working at Troo Hoops, I was a customer first, I bought my first hoop and I loved it because it was collapsible. What most impressed me about Troo Hoops hoops is the tape. The tape job is so clean and even and I knew right away that I wanted to buy more hoops for a professional act that I was developing. If you’d like to learn more about Troo Hoops you can visit our website at www.troohoops.com. T-R-O-O-P, H-O-O-P-S.com. If you’d like to learn more about me or book me for any events, I am Natalie McFancy and my website www.natalie, N-A-T-A-L-I-E, Mcfancy, M-C-F-A-N-C-Y.com [nataliemcfancy .com]

Thank you for watching. I hope you enjoy these videos on hula hooping tricks and I hope you’re inspired to go out and try some of them on your own.

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If you’re buying your first hula hoop, a couple of tips that I can offer you are to notice the size, the weight, and the material that your hoop is made out of. I have a couple of examples here of different sizes. I would suggest for everyone buying their very first hoop, to go with one that is about the height from the floor to your belly button. It can be a little higher or a little bit lower, depending on what is most comfortable for you. That is what I find to be the most ideal diameter. It’s usually about 39 inches, give or take.

As far as the material, you want to look for something that is lightweight but still has a nice weight to it, and is usually one inch or three-quarter inches in width. The hoop I have here is three-quarter inches. One inch is also a great size for your very first hoop.

Then the next thing that you want to think about is the taping design, do you want to have tape on it. It’s not necessary to have tape. It’s really helpful to have some kind of cloth tape to help the hoop have a little bit of texture and grip so that it will stick to your body and your clothing whenever you’re trying to hoop with it. It’s really, really difficult to hoop with a hoop like this one that is completely smooth, even though it might be very pretty, it’s difficult to keep it on your clothing because it’s so slick. So go with on that has a grippy tape, it’s about 39 inches give or take, the height of your bellybutton, and it’s no more than two pounds. I would not recommend using any weighted hoops, or hoops that are more than two pounds, not necessary.

Hooping is an aerobic activity and not weight training. So anything more than two pounds is probably going to cause some discomfort and bruising. And those are some things to consider when buying your first hula hoop.

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To hula hoop longer you need to learn certain techniques for keeping the hoop up when it starts to fall. So start feet hip distance apart, one foot slightly in front of the other, knees nice and soft, shifting your weight from one foot to the other. I like to think about pressing forward with my left hip to keep the hoop going.

So starting with it on your waist. Now if this is really hard for you and the hoop starts to fall right away, the technique for bringing it back up is that you bend your knees so your spine is nice and straight, straight down into the hoop, and then start pushing really hard and quickly with that left hip to get the hoop to come back up, and then stand back up.

So I’ll demonstrate that now. You’re around your waist. Hoop starts to fall. Bend down. Hip, hip, hip to bring it back up. Couple more times. Hoop’s falling. Hip, hip, hip. Notice how my spine stays nice and straight? I’m not bending over. Hip, hip, hip. And let’s say I were to bend over to try and get the hoop to come back up, and this would start to happen, and I’ve totally lost my horizontal waist hooping.

One thing also to consider, if the hoop continues to fall, even though you’re trying these techniques and practicing a lot, is that you may be using a hoop that is too small or too light for you. The diameter of your hoop for a beginner should be at least or almost to the height of your belly button from the floor. This is a very good size for starting. I also suggest using a hoop that has a nice weight to it. No heavier than two pounds, but around the one pound range is a good starting weight. So if you notice that your hoop is very light and very small, that is probably the main problem that you’re having. So keep that in mind when trying. I’ll demonstrate this one more time to hoop longer. Then it falls, bending down, picking it back up with your hip. And that is how you hula hoop longer.

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The speed of your hooping has a lot to do with the size of hoop that you are hooping with. And I’m definitely going to show you how to hoop faster with whatever hoop that you happen to be using. If you use a larger hoop that maybe comes to about the belly button height or higher, it’s going to rotate around your body more slowly than a hoop that is any smaller than that.

So as a quick demo, I’ll give you an example. I’m going to try and make this hoop go as slow as I possibly can. Notice the rhythm of my left hip. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. Okay? So now I’m going to do the same thing with this smaller hoop, and notice how much more quickly I have to move to keep it going. One, two, three, four, one. Almost twice as fast. So that has a lot to do with the speed of your hooping.

If you want to hoop faster with any hoop, all you have to do is speed up the rhythm that that driving hip is pushing the hoop around. Make sure you really give it some force to make it go around you faster. So I’m going to start slow. One, two, three, four. Now I’m going to start pushing faster and harder with that left hip, and the hoop speeds up significantly. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four.

Now the benefits of this are just for fun. If you’re trying to match the rhythm of your favorite song or you’re trying to impress some friends, it’s nice to hoop faster, but it’s not really necessary for learning any special tricks or showing off your dance technique or expertise and skill. So I find that it’s really great to just put on whatever music I like to hoop to best and try to match my hooping to that rhythm. And so that is how you hula hoop faster.

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For a vertical shoulder duck-out it’s helpful to have your shoulders exposed so that the hoop can grip against your skin. It’s much easier that way.

So we’re going to start vertical hooping around our neck. Make sure that your feet are a little wider than hip distance apart and nice and soft because that’s going to give you the momentum to keep the hoop going. So give it a push, knees nice and soft, bouncing up and down. Then notice when the hoop makes a space in front of you. When the hoop is down in front of you, you’re going to slide your right shoulder forward, rotating it forward inside the hoop.

As you feel the hoop pass off from your neck onto your shoulder you’re going to tuck your chin and slide your head out of the rotation of the hoop. Then the hoop will continue to rotate around your shoulder one full rotation. Then once it gets back down onto your back, once again you can duck your head back in and continue your neck hooping.

So one more time slowly. The hoop makes a space in front of me. I slide my shoulder in. I’m rotating my whole body towards my left, slightly. Hoop makes a rotation around your shoulder. Then once it comes back down, tuck your chin, slide your head back in, and continue hooping around your neck.

All right. So let’s give this a try, feet hip distance, knees nice and soft, down, down, down, shoulder. Continue that knee bounce to get the hoop going again. Down, down, down, shoulder, neck back in, continue the knee bounce to get it going again.

And that’s how you do a vertical shoulder duck-out.

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To do a shoulder pop with the hula hoop, we’re going to start in a hand roll. My hand is out in front of me, my thumb is up. I’m keeping it nice and strong there, allowing the hoop to roll over my left hand.

My hoop is rotating clockwise. Now, when the hoop is down, I’m going to grab it slightly and pull it in towards me. Lean forward. Allow the hoop then, to roll across your shoulders. Then, once you feel that downward momentum of the hoop resting across your back, quickly stand up out of it, and the momentum of the hoop coming around this right shoulder will throw it up into the air. And then you’re just going to catch it with your right hand.

So, slow motion. Hand roll on the left. Grab, around the shoulders. Notice how it’s touching my body all the way across. Pop off this shoulder, and catch it on the right hand. A little faster this time; perfect.

And that’s how you do a shoulder pop.

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Surface switching is a very important tool that a lot of hoopers use when switching the hoop from the front of your body to the back of your body, or over your head to on your body. And basically, what it means is the hand position in relationship to your hoop is moving from inside to outside, or outside to inside. And the way that we do this is a little maneuver with the thumb. You want to keep the palm nice and flat and keep the thumb ready to get in there and assist you.

So we’re going to start with the hoop in our vertical plane, hand roll going forward. Notice my thumb is up, my palm is forward. What I want to do now is I want to bring the hoop in front of my body and then move my hand from outside to inside the hoop. Notice my hand is inside the hoop now? I’m going to grab it. I’m going to rotate so now that my hand is on the outside of the hoop.

From here, I’m going to stick my thumb in, keep the rotation of the hoop going the same direction, and then I’m going to release with my fingers so that they can now come inside the hoop to continue that hand roll. I’ll do this again slowly. Inside the hoop, grab, rotate to the front of your body. And now outside. Thumb in, release the fingers, hand roll in front of you.

Okay, so a little quicker. Hand roll, grab, thumb, fingers, switch. One more time, that same speed. Hand roll, grab, thumb, fingers. So this is really useful whenever you start doing double hooping or being able to switch from which side of your body the hoop is on. And that’s how you do surface switching.

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To do an illusion, you want to practice without your hoop, a lot, first. So we’re going to put the hoop down, and what you want to do is really do a lot of stretching, and practicing doing what is called a sanding split. So the way to do that is you stand on whichever foot is more comfortable, find one that is the most stable for you, whichever foot it might be. You can try both, I suggest doing both. And then you’re going to bend forward, place your hands on the floor, and take your other leg and lift it as high as you can. Ideally you want to make this a straight line, like what is called a standing split. Practice doing this, practice taking your arms away and reaching them back behind you. Do the other side quickly, and forward, leg straight up in the air, really keeping my leg straight, and reaching my toe all the ay to the ceiling. This takes a lot of flexibility. Now it doesn’t mean that if you aren’t flexible that you can’t do an illusion, I’m still going to teach you that technique.

Okay, so then what you’re going to do is what is called a pivot, or a pirouette. So you’re going to step onto your right foot, with the weight into the ball of your foot, so that your heel is almost off the ground. Then you’re going to rotate your body all the way around from one side to the other. So without doing the illusion, I’m just going to practice the pivot. Step onto your right foot, rotate all the way around. Okay? One more time, pivot all the way around.

So then what is going to happen is we’re going to add our standing split into that turn. What’s going to happen is my left toe is going to make an arc this way, up and over to the other side, and my head is going to do the underside of the circle, on the other side of my leg. So my head goes this way, my toe goes this way, you want to keep them at opposite points.

So putting those two together, with the sanding split, stepping into it, and also doing the turns. You can place your hands on the floor the first couple times to practice, okay? So we’re going to give it a try, placing your foot where you want to turn, hand on the floor, leg up, turning all the way around to the other side. I’ll do it once more. Placing the hands on the floor to catch yourself.

Now of course this trick is not an illusion unless you don’t use your hands. So what I like to do is to think about, my arms are shooting back, reaching back behind me, keeping my lats nice and tight, and into my body. I’m using the momentum of my chest and my head to swing myself around, okay? So here we go, illusion with no hands. One more time.

Now what do I do with my hoop when I’m doing my illusion? There are lots of things that you can try. Okay, so starting with the hoop in your left hand, passing to your right, going behind your leg, passing off and ending in your right hand. Left hand, I’m going to pivot on my right foot, my left leg is going to arc up and over, my head is going to go down, and I’m just going to pass around my leg, so. Again, going the other way.

And that’s how you do a hula hoop illusion.

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To hula hoop on one shoulder or to do what is called a Shoulder Duck-Out, you’re going to start with the hoop on your neck. You can also do this trick with the hoop around your shoulders, but I find that it’s easier to learn starting with it on your neck and then work your way up to that.

So also, keep in mind that it will be easier if you pull your hair up out of the way and also have your shoulders bare versus having sleeves like I have. It’ll be a little bit easier if the hoop is making contact with your skin. All right, so starting with the hoop around your neck, nice, relaxed stance, hooping to the left. Notice when the hoop is making a space in front of you, that is where you’re going to stick your shoulder in to do your shoulder duck out.

So let’s practice the position of the body first. If the hoop is going around your neck, making a space in front of you, rotate your left shoulder forward and up and then bend directly to the side, sticking that shoulder up so you have a nice position for the hoop to rotate around your shoulder. After the hoop makes a rotation, you’re going to pop back up into the hoop.

Okay? So shoulder forward, then side, pop up into the hoop. Hoop going around your neck. Front, front, front, front. Shoulder come forward, bend, and pop back up into the hoop. Notice that my hair keeps getting in my face. Don’t notice that. All right, front, front, front, front, shoulder. And it will help you also to rotate when you pop back up, to continue the hoop rotating around your body. Usually you will continue with it around your shoulders from there.

I’ll demonstrate that a couple more times. Hooping on your neck. Front, front, front, shoulder. And voila. You can also continue keeping the hoop on your shoulder if you’re really brave. Otherwise, just do the quick shoulder duck out. And that’s how you do a shoulder duck out.

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To hula hoop on one leg, you’re going to first practice some balancing positions, because the hardest part about hooping on one leg is, obviously, being able to stand on one foot with the other leg above the hoop, and also make it look nice, you know, you don’t hoop like this because it’s not very pretty.

So we start with hooping around our knees, and what you’re going to do is you’re going to lift one leg out. You can pick whichever one is easiest for you. I like to stand on my left leg. So plant your left leg, make sure your foot is nice and strong, knee is a little bit soft, because you’re going to be moving and hooping on that leg.

Lift your right leg up, so that your foot clears your knee position. So if you have to rotate, sometimes you can practice this tree pose holding the foot, if that’s easy for you, then you can practice taking the foot out to the side, maybe work on your flexibility a little bit, these are some great yoga poses as well.

You can also take the leg behind you and do your scorpion or your standing bow, which is a really pretty position. My personal favorite is arabesque, where I lift my leg out and I extend it straight with my straight knee to the back. So this is the version that I’m going to teach you today, because I find it to be the prettiest and also the easiest to do at first.

Okay, so to start knee hooping, knees together, legs glued together, no space. When your knees are straight, you’re pushing the hoop back, and when your knees are bending, you’re kicking the hoop forward. Notice from the side, as I bend the hoop goes forward, as I straighten the hoop goes back, obviously on a much faster tempo.

So when the hoop comes forward, I’m going to lift my right leg out. Okay so we go front, front, front, front, lift, so my right foot clears the hoop, and then what I’m going to do right away is stretch that leg back behind me and straighten that knee. Notice my body is tilting forward slightly. That’s okay, don’t worry about the hoop on the leg just yet. So we’re going front, front, front, front, front, lift, stretch it back, and I’m bending forward.

All right, so now what is the standing leg going to do? When I lift my leg out and extend it back, my left leg is going to have to stay bent and move to keep the hoop going on my leg, lift it up, extend it back, straight, straight, straight, straight, straight, straight, just like you did whenever you had both knees together. Try to keep that same rhythm. So without the hoop, straight, straight, straight, straight, lift, straight, straight, straight, straight, straight, straight.

So now we’re going to try it with the hoop. Starting around your knees, front, front, front, front, lift it out, legs in the back, straight, straight, straight, straight, straight, straight. Don’t forget to smile at your audience.

And that’s how you hula hoop on one leg.

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Now we’re going to focus on the techniques for bringing the hoop up from your knees up to your waist.

Before I start I’d like you to keep in mind that this is a very advanced maneuver. When I first started learning to hoop I started working on this and I only just now, three years later, have it consistently. And there are still some times whenever my costume gets in the way.

It’s a difficult trick, so don’t be discouraged. Just keep trying. It’ll be easier for some people than others. It’s really helpful if you wear shorts and not pants or leggings, like I have on, or jeans, something where you can feel the hoop and have it against your skin. It will also help if your hoop has a little bit of tape on the inside so that it will stick to you a little bit better.

So, we’re going to start with our basic knee hooping. Legs glued together, no space in between. Rotating the hoop nice and level. When I have my hoop on my knees, I usually have it a couple of inches above my kneecaps. You’ll notice that the hoop rotates about here. If the hoop gets down here it’s really, really difficult to bring it back up. So, focus on trying to hold the hoop at that position.

Then while you’re knee hooping, when you are ready to bring the hoop up you’re going to start pumping one leg at a time. Notice that right now I’m pumping both my knees equally at the same time, to keep the hoop level. So what I’m going to do is I’m going to pump my left then my right, left, right, left, right, left, right. And the hoop begins to walk its way up my body.

So I’ll show that slowly. I’ve got both knees going straight. Then I go left, right, left, right, left, right. At that point the hoop is about hip level. Once it gets to hip height you’re going to bend down into it and just wiggle like crazy to bring it up to your waist.

OK. So, I’ll try to do it slowly. I’ve got both knees straight or both knees together. Then I switch, left, right, left, right, left, right. Bend down, wiggle to bring it up. Notice that I’m rotating as I do it. That’s helping me to get the trick a little more easily than if I was to try and stay facing front.

So, knees together at the same time. Left, right, left, right, left, right. Wiggle, waist hoop. OK. Do it a few more times.

That’s how we bring the hoop from your knees to your waist.

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To bring the hoop from your waist to your neck, you have to do what is called a shimmy. What you’re going to do is you’re going to work your arms inside the hoop and wiggle the hoop up to your neck.

The technique for this is mostly in the timing. You’ve got the hoop going around your waist. Notice when it’s in front of you, when it’s touching your belly, when it’s making a space, a loop so to speak, in front of you, and you can notice that timing by counting, you can say front, front, front, front, front, and try just sticking your arm in every time that it comes around, try it with the left, try it with the right.

Then I would suggest starting with one arm at a time, try sticking the arm in and continuing to hoop with the arm inside against your side. Stick the arm in when it’s in your front, and keep it glued to your side. Notice how this automatically makes my shoulder start moving in order to keep the hoop going. Try the other hand, notice when it’s making a space, it’s sticking in, try to keep it going, hoop starts to wiggle up right away.

Okay, so when we start to stick both arms in, what we’re going to do is stick your arms in, glue them to your sides, and wiggle your shoulder so that the hoop will start to walk its way up to your neck, so it looks like this, okay? Let’s try that with the hoop. Sticking one arm in, both arms in, wiggle it up, and then you got it going around your neck.

Let’s try that again. Hooping around your waist, one arm, both arms, wiggle it up, and we’re neck hooping. So that’s your hula hoop shimmy. Do it a couple more times, a little faster. That is how we do our hula hoop shimmy.

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To do a foot pass or a scorpion, you’re going to begin by passing the hoop around your body. So I have my hoop in the horizontal plane in front of me, both hands grabbing, and I rotate around, palm down to pass off, and continue. So I’ve got this, pass, going around the body to start.

When I have the hoop in my right hand, I’m going to put my left foot out and place the hoop onto my foot, like so. It’s important to keep your foot flexed so that the hoop doesn’t fly off of your leg. The motion of my leg is going to go like this. I’m going to do it facing the side so you can see all the way around to the back. I catch the hoop on my foot in front, I’m going to keep my toe facing up and then quickly rotate so that my heel is inside the hoop and the hoop is around my ankle. And then I’m going to reach back, grab the hoop and bring it around in front.

So from the side, passing, foot, around, grab. That was slow. Let’s do it a little faster. So that’s a foot pass or a scorpion. If you want to make it really fancy, you can bring the leg up really high and make it really dramatic as you catch the hoop. I’m not going to do that today. That’s how you do a foot pass.

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To do a hula hoop drop on, we’re going to start in lasso, again, with our right hand over our head and our thumb out, hand directly over head. So starting with the hoop out to your right, swing to your left, keeping the hoop right over head, and the part where the hoop is touching my palm, I’m going to grab it and then I’m going to being my hand down across my body with the hoop now around my waist and then allow the rotation to continue around my waist.

So starting from lasso, down across. Again. Touches my palm, down across. So that’s a drop on with the right hand, we can also do this with the left hand. So rotating the same direction to the left with the left hand over head and lasso, grab the hoop, bring it across your body in the same direction and give it a little momentum to keep continuing around your waist. So, lasso, across your body, push to keep going around your waist. Remember also that all of these tricks are easier when you rotate while you try them, I’ll demonstrate that. So, dropping on with the right hand, and dropping on with the left hand, rotating. And that’s how you do a drop on.

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To do a duck in we’re going to start with the hoop and lasso in our left hand. So we’re rotating the hoop to the left, my thumb is out to keep the hoop from falling, and it’s directly over my head. As the hoop comes into my palm, I’m going to grab it and swing it around with my palm up behind my back.

I’m going to show that a couple of times slowly. I have lasso here, grab behind my back. One more time, grab behind my back.

Now as the hoop comes around behind my back, I’m going to bend over to get out of the way and allow the hoop to rotate over my head as it would normally do if I was doing it continuously. So I’ll show just that part, lasso over my head, grab behind the back, bend over. You notice how the hoop comes over my body.

Now, once the hoop is in this position, see my arm is all the way behind my back. I’m going to stand up inside of it and allow the hoop to continue rotating around my waist, in one swift motion.

So breaking it down, lasso over my head, grab, bend over, stand up inside the hoop and continue waist hooping. Notice how when I’m doing it slowly, I use my right hand to push the hoop to get it to go around my waist. Whenever I was learning this for the first time I used that to help me get the motion of it and eventually you won’t need that right hand.

Let’s try to do it in one swift motion. Again. And that’s how you do a duck in.

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To do an escalator with the hoop, you’re going to start with the hoop out to your side, in a flat plane. You’re going to take your right foot, that’s my right. So I’m going to take my right foot and step inside the hoop, so that the hoop is around my right leg, coming across my right ankle.

Then, I’m going to, with my right hand, rotate the hoop the other way towards my body, like towards my belly. I’m bringing my hands to my belly button. As I do that, I’m going to pick up my left foot, and put it against my knee, so that the hoop comes around my left leg.

So as I do that, this arm is going to come out. I’m going to catch the hoop in my armpit, allow the hoop to continue to swing around; catch it with my right hand above my head, and continue the rotation around. So, slowly break it down. Right foot steps inside; left foot to your knee. The hoop’s going to catch underneath my left arm. Bring it across to your belly. Swing around. Grab on the right side, and rotate the hoop.

A little faster, one more time, like that. You can see that once you start doing it a little more quickly, it happens a little bit more naturally.

And that’s how you do an escalator.

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So, to do your Cat Eyes we’re going to start with our isolation. One handed.

The hoop’s in front of you about top of your head height and belly button. I’m leading with my pinky finger to do my one handed isolation. And my hoop is rotating counter-clockwise.

So, to start the Cat Eye. It looks like this. And what the illusion is is that the hoop is dropping down and then coming straight up. Without moving out of this plane or going side to side. We want the hoop to make a vertical column, so to speak.

So, we start in this position with the hand at six o’clock. You’re going to move your hand slightly to your right to allow the hoop to drop down on the back of your hand.

So, I’m here. My hand moves slightly. And then, I allow it to rest on the back of my hand here. As the hoop rolls across my hand, I’m going to grab again on my left side to bring it back in front of me.

Now, this is the tricky part. From this position my hand is going to go straight up. So, I start here and move to my right. Allow the hoop to drop. Grab. Bring it straight up.

So, the path of my hand goes left, down, up, straight over my head.

So, I’m basically making a big arch there. Going to make, the entire step involves making a box with your hand. Okay.

So, I’m here. Move to the right. Allow the hoop to drop. Grab. Bring it straight up overhead. And then I’ve got the hoop straight above me. My hand is at 12 o’clock.

As I continue the hoop rotation over I’m going to move back out to the left to allow the hoop to come back into that center position.

Now, ideally, my hand would end here so that I could just continue to do it again over and over. With practice that will happen. But, I like to add in just a little center isolation to give myself some time to prepare for the next Cat Eye.

So, isolation. Move your hand to the right. Drop. Grab. Bring it straight up and back to center. One isolation to finish. A little faster. Goes like this.

And that’s how you do a Cat Eye.

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For iso-pops you want to start with your basic isolation. So, to quickly cover how we do isolations, we start with the hoop in front of you, slightly above your head, belly button height, framing your upper body. Hand is at 6 o’clock, tracing the inside of the hoop, and then releasing to go over the top. Make sure you go both directions.

I find that for doing iso-pops it’s helpful to start my isolations counterclockwise. So, for you if you’re facing the camera, counterclockwise would be this way. I’d be leading with my pinkie of my right hand to do those isos.

OK. So, for the iso-pop, my hand is going to basically trace a diamond pattern. I’m going to move to 9 o’clock, 12 o’clock, 3 o’clock, 6 o’clock. So, diamond pattern. Alright. So I have a pretty firm grip on the hoop to hold it in this position. You’re going to push as you move your hand to your 9 o’clock position. Then, release as you go to 12 o’clock and the hoop should actually roll across the back of your hand. As it swings across, your hand is going to move to the 3 o’clock position and grab the hoop from the outside.

This is the most tricky part from here. You have a nice, firm grip but loose enough to rotate your hand to the inside, bend your elbow, and bring your hand back down to 6 o’clock.

So, again, slowly, 9 o’clock, 12 o’clock, 3 o’clock, 6. Up and over. Down. Up and over. Down. Notice how the hoop is rolling across the back of my hand but staying in this plane. It should look as if it’s floating across in front of me without dipping down below my bottom hand.

Again, slowly. A little faster. It looks nice if you throw in a few isolations in between, to reset.

You can also reverse this. You just reverse it exactly the same way that we did it in the other direction. Make sure that you practice both hands.

And that’s how we do a hula hoop iso-pop.

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For a back isolation, there are a couple of different ways that you can get into this particular trick. I’m going to show the way I think is the easiest. Start with the hoop down in front of you, grabbing from the outside. You’re going to swing the hoop, pinky side to your right, and down behind you. As it falls behind you, your hand is going to switch to the inside. I’m going to show that again. Outside, inside. So this is a key point. Now the hoop is framing my upper body. This is 3:00, this is 9:00. So we’ll start from here. Swing the hoop, practice getting to this position. Again, it’s in front, pinky leaves, framing your body. Okay?

So we’re going to leave this hand out a bit. We’re going to get to this position, then your right hand is going to trace the top of your hoop over your head for the isolation. Then allow the hoop to continue to fall and we’re back in position one. So, we’re here, in front of you, lead with your pinky who goes behind your body. I’m keeping my elbow in tight, up and over your head, allow it to fall. A little smoother. Make sure you practice both hands, so I’ll do it with the left hand now. And that’s how we do a back isolation.

Transcript

To do a vertical back roll, you’re going to start in your hand roll with the hoop in front of you, rotating counter-clockwise. So, I’ve got my thumb up, my palm towards the left. Give it a push. My hoop is rotating counter-clockwise. I’m keeping it nice and strong in front of me, keeping my thumb out. Then, when the hoop touches your palm, you’re going to give it a grab. Then, you’re going to bend forward inside the hoop, allowing the hoop to then roll across your back, sticking your left arm in, grabbing as it comes across. And then, let go with the right and continue the hand roll on the left.

So let’s switch back slowly once again. Grab, bend forward. Allow the whole hoop to roll across your back. Left hand grabs from the left side, continue your hand roll. A little bit quicker this time. Grab, roll, hand roll. Again.

And that’s how you do a vertical back roll.

Transcript

For our across the chest roll we’re going to start the same way as we would do our across the back roll.

The hoop is in my right hand. My grip is nice and loose. I just have my first two fingers making a loop. My other fingers are just cradling the hoop.

And it’s keep making a nice flat plane in front of my body. So, I’ve got the hoop hanging. Vertical plane in my right hand.

What a lot of people tend to do when they learn this trick is they learn to do a toss. Or they toss and bend this arm and bring the hoop to their chest.

It’s not necessarily cheating. It just looks better if we do a true roll when the hoop is making contact with your arm all the way across your chest to the other hand.

So, arm is nice and straight. Level with my shoulder. Slightly in front of my shoulder and my left arm is out to the side ready to receive.

So, palm is nice and loose. I’m going to bring the hoop up gently and then press my palm down as I release. I’m going to show this again. So, that’s how we start the roll.

Now, whenever we want to roll across our chest it’s very effective to lean way back and really open up your throat and your chest to the sky. If you try to look at the hoop it looks a little congested and awkward. And it’s not as pretty.

So, you’re going to drop your head back, lean way back and allow the hoop to roll across your chest. It’s also helpful to turn your head and look towards your receiving hand. It’ll look nicer.

So, as the hoop approaches my shoulder I’m going to lean back. Look towards my left hand and have that hand ready, open palm up, to receive the hoop.

So, let’s try this all together. There we go.

And that’s how we do an across the chest roll.

Transcript

Across the back roll with the hula hoop is probably a favorite of everyone for hula hooping. So, we are going to start with the hoop in our right hand hanging loosely in your first two fingers. So, I’m making a loop here holding the hoop gently. Notice that my hoop is in the vertical plane directly off to my side.

The first step of this trick is getting the hoop from your hand to your shoulder. So, we’re going to focus on that first. We’re going to bring the hoop up as the hoop is coming up above your arm. You’re going to release and press your palm down. So, let’s practice just that first part. Palm down, allowing it to roll. It’s okay to go nice and slow first. Slow and controlled. Release, palm down. Again. Release, palm down.

Then, once the hoop gets to your shoulder, you’re going to bend over making a nice, flat back. So, let’s practice just the motion. Release, palm down, flat back. Notice how flat my back is. If you try to look at the hoop, then your back will not be flat, and therefore the hoop will go some crazy direction. So, release, flat back. Notice also how straight my arms are. This is a part of the visual effect of the hoop rolling across, is that it goes one hand to the other. So, it’s important to keep that right arm straight as you release. One of the tendencies that people do is to bend this arm and start the roll there, which is cheating. Another tendency that people have is to toss the hoop, which is not necessarily wrong, but we want to do a true roll. When the hoop gets between my elbow and my shoulder, I’m going to do the flat back and I’m going to look to my left hand to catch the hoop.

So, the catching side. Now, we’re going to focus on the hoop rolled across your back and coming down this arm. Ideally, if it rolls perfectly, it’s going to go all the way down your left arm and you’re going to catch it on the outside of the hoop. Now, you must be prepared if the hoop is going slightly behind your arm or in front of you, so just stick that hand in and allow the hoop to rotate around your hand to continue the momentum.

So, starting from the top. Release, palm down, grab. And that’s how you do an across the back roll.

Transcript

To hula hoop around your ankles, you’re going to focus on one foot at a time. So plant your right foot, make sure that your back is nice and straight, your knee is a little bit soft, not locked back. So knee a little bit soft, weight on your right foot. Your left foot is going to draw little circles around from front to back. Okay? So drawing a little circle with my left foot, low to the ground, front to back. Then we want to switch feet so plant your left foot, knee nice and soft. Right foot is going to come back to front, back to front, back to front. It’s like I’m making a small capital “D” or a small circle on the floor.

Now, I’m exaggerating this a little bit as I demonstrate. It’s very, very small motion. Very, very small. See how close together my ankles are. All right, so let’s try this with the hoop. I like to keep the hoop about shin height. If it goes any lower, sometimes it tends to hit the ground, which is okay. You’ll… Oh, as you get better at it and practice, it will hit the ground less and less. So keeping it horizontal, give it a push and start pushing with your left foot, keeping those circles nice and small. Try switching, right foot. The hoop will hit the ground a few times, it’s okay. Once you start getting used to this you can turn as you do it. Notice how I’m switching feet between rotation. My left foot is the main driver. And that’s how you do ankle hooping.

Transcript

For vertical chest hooping, you’re going to keep the hoop on your upper chest. Knees are soft. Feet are slightly wider than hip distance apart. You’re going to bend forward. Notice how my back is nice and straight, and the motion of the hoop comes from your knees.

I’m going to do a little bit of pressing down with my upper back and chest, but most of the motion is going to come from your knees bending, and making the hoop go up and down.

So, I’ve got my hoop on a vertical plane. It’s slightly on an angle. You can always bend over forwards more, if I have a really flat back then I can keep the hoop nice and vertical. But you can play around with it. Okay.

So, giving the hoop a nice push, and pressing down with my knees bending; it’s helpful to keep the arms out of the way. Extending the elbows, I’ll show what this looks like from the front. This is a better view.

That’s how we do vertical chest hooping.