TWISTING DIRECTION VS ROUNDOFFS
Before anyone learns how to do twisting skills like front halves, they universally learn roundoffs or roundoff back handsprings. This builds strength, body awareness, and gets the athletes comfortable with the concept of being upside down while also training a practical skill in its own right. The tricky part, though, is when it comes to trying to front half/barani. Many gymnasts or self-taught acrobats learn it as a no-handed roundoff. Makes sense, right? Well, in most cases, no.There is a minority of athletes who hurdle with the “wrong” leg for their twisting; someone who does a roundoff with their left leg in front and then does a back full that twists to the right, for example. In most cases, though, the twist will go in the direction of the leading hurdle leg- roundoff with the left leg in front and putting the left hand down first, twisting their flips out of it to the left. So far that makes sense, but then it all comes crashing down when you look at the actual mechanics of the roundoff. As you cartwheel or roundoff with the left leg in front, your body begins to turn to the right- do a cartwheel like this and note which direction your chest/stomach faces throughout the skill. It may feel like the movement twists to the left, and it feels natural to do a back full to the left afterwards, but the skill itself is twisting right.
Doing a no handed roundoff isn’t such a big deal, but the real kicker is when acrobats try to convert the no handed roundoff into a front full. Very, very often I see people twist one way (their roundoff direction) in the first half, then twist the other direction back to the front. Half left, half right, for example (it usually is more like quarter-quarter, but the point is the midair direction change). This is a fairly easy habit to correct, but it requires changing the way the front half is thought about. Instead of thinking of a no handed roundoff, it should become a variation on front tucks/pikes/layouts. The way I teach it, my athletes do front tuck or pike with a strong kickout, trampolinist-style. Once the timing and feeling for the kickout is established, we determine which way they should actually be twisting and add a late quarter turn in that direction during the kickout. If, for example, the gymnast twists left I make them dismount trampoline onto a mat with a front pike, kick out and turn everything simultaneously to face the left hand side of the gym.
Once this is comfortable, we add the extra quarter and they drill piked front half. After drilling until it is natural and consistently twisting the correct direction, we try to add another quarter, focusing on where their body is going and what they see, and in doing so they usually wind up doing their front full correctly. This drill helps with twisting direction, staying tight so everything twists simultaneously, visual cues while inverted, and setting longer (almost everybody tries to twist too early, especially when they’re trying to twist like a roundoff).