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The key to learning a backroll is to not think about the trick at all before coming into it. Just edge in like you would for a normal w2w trick just making sure you keep your hands in at your waist for control, pop, tuck your back arm into your back quad almost like you are trying to charley horse yourself with your elbow and just keep looking back until you spot the water and land. It is a pure momentum trick, just like a raley, where once you pop and commit you don't have to do anything else to land it, the boat, rope and your natural momentum will set you down as if you never left the water. Same goes for a scarecrow so if you can land a back roll, then it is time to go out and learn raleys and scarecrows the next day. I learned all of my basic inverts in the days of Greg Necrasson and the elephant so when i went to learn the scarecrow, i just assumed to cut as hard as he cuts because that is what the trick is and then i can learn an elephant. DO NOT DO THIS WHEN LEARNING SCARECROWS. I landed the first one i ever tried, with a full edge 20 feet out into the flats and remember just like it was yesterday thinking, wow that was really easy. Of course i hop back over and decide to go for another one and landed completely perpendicular to the water, possibly the worst fall i've ever taken behind a boat. I immediately decided never to do that again and just take the 180 back and do the elephant and i think i landed it first or second try and never had to deal with falls like that again. With elephants, you either fall on your butt or go over your toes but very tame falls even when going as big as possible. Let me also note that an elephant was never and should never be made into a w2w trick. It is a trick that should almost look and feel like a toeside s-bend and is done with the hardest possible edge you can dig in there. It is probably my biggest pet peeve when it comes to online videos seeing a kid doing a w2w toeside shifty frontroll, and i enjoy watching any video that someone throws together whether they are just learning how to go w2w or if they are hitting 9s. Just please do not deface the elephant, ever.
*wow sorry for the crazy rant, for me Greg Necrasson's elephant symbolizes wakeboaring. Free 4 All, Shafted, and Shaft will make you want to forget whatever trick you are trying and try Necrasson Elephants. I still think Shafted is the greatest video ever made and Parks' section is just now starting to get sections that are on the same level of technicality as that section. Parks' landed 13 900s in a row on that trip on a board that would take someone like Harley Clifford or Phillip to maybe come close to a 9 on it not to mention with 2.5" rainbow fins on it. It was even crazier that in 12 Honkey's after being dropped by Free Motion and I think already being on Hyperlite's team that he still rode that board and just spray painted it. His section in 12 Honkey's with the mohawk and death metal is the most powerful riding that has ever been in a video still to this day. His sections in Shafted are still my favorite because it is was made me want to ride every day but that section in 12 Honkey's I don't think will ever be touched until we get another guy like Parks to come up on the scene. I know people are going to say Harley, but Harley is more of the changing of the guard with Phillip. When you see guys video parts today, you can see the concentration in their eyes. When Parks' was doing his best stuff 10 years ago, all you saw was controlled chaos. He never came into the wake thinking about how to do the trick. He came into the wake knowing he could do the trick and how far can he take it. The guy landed a temper tantrum at the same age as Harley now and then invented the half cab double back roll and still to this day has the hardest trick ever done on a wakeboard in the double mobe. People took his half cab double back roll for granted but there is a reason you haven't seen anyone come close to landing it off the double up yet because it is that hard and you have to go that big, and the consequences could be season ending. Ruck sticking it off the kicker grabbed was super sick but I don't know if we will see anyone land it off the double up besides Parks. I'm sure it is Ruck's goal this year and will hopefully get him back into the spotlight he deserves. The only other two guys in sports that do anything like it is Travis Rice and Travis Pastrana, and they all have the same mentality and that same controlled chaos look when it comes to their tricks. I think the greatest thing that could ever happen is a)Red Bull takes Parks and gets him back into peak physical health and shape and then B) come out with a video of only the three of them. It would be crazy to see what would come out of that because even though they are in three different sports, the drive that each one of them possesses to have the closing section could really bring about some incredible things. HOLY TANGENT TUESDAY!!*
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