Skipping along

I become obsessed with skipping.
Youtube is a fount of knowledge.

Type in ;
skipping rope
boxers jump rope
jump rope
jump rope workout
corde a saute
saltando con la corda
touwtje springen
double unders

be prepared to be hooked !

Different steps 

All of a sudden, I wanted to do as many different steps as possible.
I found Buddy Lee on there and he was leaping about like a jack in the box.
I found the Duvide videos too with a demonstration of all the different workout jumps in slow motion.

My two footed jump began to seem a bit lame.
I wanted to run my legs while the rope flashed by.
My legs had other ideas.
The rope was trying really hard to trip me up.
It knew what I wanted to do and it wasn't going to let me.

Eventually,I decided that if I couldn't do the 'easy hop from foot to foot' that Mr Buddy Lee described.
I would just hop on one foot on its own.
I did. Then just on the other.
Then miracle of miracles, I lost my balance and hopped onto the other foot and back.
Hooray! I could use two feet independently of one another.

This is the secret code of skipping. Until you can go foot to foot,you can do very little.
At once, I could do the skiers jump,the bell,the jump jack,the twist. (all two footed jumps).
Then I tried the boxers shuffle ,the running jump(heheheh!) ,the can can...
They were all doable.

This lasted me round for a good long while. I skipped and skipped for the cold months and worked up to an hour of skipping.
The other half (has access to a gym at work and the London parks) worked out in his breaks.

Then I discovered the Double under.

This was the new Holy Grail.

For a double under,you must jump up and spin the rope fast,so it goes twice under your feet before you land.
I leapt and stood on the rope , leapt and nearly tripped, leapt and whipped my bare legs(they had lines on all day).
It was a whole month before I got 1 double under jump.
I watched so many demonstration videos and eventually found this great Double unders demonstration

I listened and watched and tried it myself and yippee, I did two in a row.

My skips become shorter because I did spreads of trying to do double unders in between the warm up and cool down.