How I Discovered Tricking

I am often asked how I got into tricking.  For those interested, here is the story :)

I have been very athletic literally since I could walk.  My parents started me in developmental gymnastics at 10 months old.  I did recreational gymnastics until I was about 8 years old.  I outgrew recreational gymnastics and joined a competitive gymnastics program where I competed to level 9.  I was putting in 25 – 30 hours per week in gymnastics training in addition to my martial arts competition training and schooling.  I just didn’t have enough hours in the day to do everything so I dropped competitive gymnastics in late 2009.

 At 6 years old I started my first martial arts classes and it came very natural to me.  Although my karate school did not teach nor encourage students to do competitions, some of the older students competed locally, and a few even competed on the North American Sport Karate Association (N.A.S.K.A.) circuit.  My karate school had a local demo team where I was exposed to tricking.   Since I could already tumble and flip it came pretty easy for me.  I started competing locally in 2005 in Extreme Forms and added Extreme Weapons in 2006.

My tricking mainly grew out of my demo team practices and my local competitions.  The first real karate trick I learned was a 540 at the age of 8 followed by learning a b-twist shortly after that.  I just continued learning and pushing my abilities to add to the list of tricks and combos I could do.

I began tricking seriously when I started competing on the NASKA circuit in 2007.  I attended my first real tricking camp/gathering in 2008 at Loopkicks and have attended many others since.  I really enjoy and love tricking and have met a lot of amazing trickers at tournaments, camps and gatherings.  I also watch a lot of tricking videos and try to trick with others whenever I can.