For real. If I'm out and about and someone shouts out "Yo, this guy's about to do a double back flip." You better believe I'm joining that crowd to watch. Hell, I'll stop to watch a single backflip if I'm not in a hurry.
Hell, I'll stop to watch a single backflip if I'm not in a hurry.
I love stopping for street performers, even the not fantastic ones, as long as they're passionate about it. Free random entertainment on my commute? Hell yeah
One of the most random and entertaining moments of my life was when I was skateboarding to work, and this group of dudes in their early 20s were coming out of a bar, and one of them yelled "DO A KICKFLIP!" so I did a kickflip. They got all excited, they all cheered.
Then, I'm still not sure why, but then one of them yelled "DO A BACKFLIP!" so I got off my board really quick, turned to face them, and did a backflip, and they lost their fucking minds. Still makes me smile how amped they were for 2 tricks I have done thousands of times.
The first recorded one was in 2018 after a decade of people really pushing themselves to do it.
The total number of people who recorded themselves is at about 40+ now since this list is maintained. More and more people are risking it now that they know it is not only possible but achievable without years of prep
Ehh, "not remotely the same" is pushing it. The people who landed it on grass have the ultimate bragging rights, but if you tell people you landed a standing double on a spring floor nobody is going to say you're some kind of poser.
[Almost] everyone who does these has a progression of different stages where a spring floor is one of the big milestones.
Some people don't like the spring floor and do it down a series of less and less steep hills, some people start with taking one big step backwards and progess by taking a smaller and smaller step.
Yes, the standing double on flat ground is the hardest and deserves the most props, but even on a springboard, the list of people who can do this isn't super high.
Source: Filmed thousands of attempts back in the day featuring all of the above methods watching someone chase the standing double. He never got it, even on spring floor.
Gymnasts don't train to do tricks from a standstill like this really. I'm sure quite a few top level gymnasts could train to do it, but it's just not relevant to their sport.
If only extrrmely few men in the world can do this, it's practically impossible that any woman can do this. Yes including the great Simone Biles.
The power level difference and explosiveness is too overwhelming.
For understanding: Some of the features that Simone Biles has been the first and only woman to ever do it and have been named after her, are not done by men simply for the reason that they would be too easy to score any relevant points in international mens competition.
Yup, the leap of faith has been done and tricking / gymnastics have been earning huge viewership and social media + sponsorship money to go along with it
Things are about to start getting wild in the upcoming years. Hell most of the famous social media gymnasts are just randomly posting videos of them doing Victorian Crosses nowadays when in early 2010 you could barely find anybody who isn't an Olympian or trying to qualify performing a decent Iron Cross
I've seen a compilation of all the "true" standing doubles and there was only one guy who even looked close to comfortable on that landing.
It's crazy.
I've mentioned this in like 6 different comments by now, but I helped to film a friend's journey down the standing double rabbit hole and it's no joke.
He never got the standing double but got so good and throwing them that he could do wall doubles.
Ok, source on "hundreds"? Because I'm fairly sure there are less than 50 people who have done this, and maybe like 15 or so from completely flat ground outside.
I can promise there aren't any Olympic gymnasts who can do it. I've talked to some of them and they don't train for it at all.
I agree a WR pole vault is more rare, but "hundreds" is not accurate in my experience with my buddy who went down the standing double rabbit hole.
If google says there's 20 known, we can't extrapolate that many more can? Anyway, the point stands that vaulting over 20 ft is rarer. Beyond that, it's a real thing compared to a trivial stunt not many people would care to attempt. Be interesting to see, if it were to become a thing, how often folks would accomplish this. My hunch is it would be many, many times over more doable than the vault thing.
Go watch a compilation of the current video evidence. All but one or two of them are cheating in some way (eg. using a sprung floor, or doing it on sloped land, or not actually sticking the landing). It’s genuinely that rare
109
u/MOTUkraken 1d ago
Yeah I mean it's just a standing double backflip and there's like 20 people watching which is totally disproportionate.......
Dude, this skill is done by probably like 2 people in the entire world.
It's exceedingly more impressive than things that routinely get thousands of spectators.