Last updated on March 31st, 2021 at 12:26 am
How To Juggle With Juggling Clubs – A Beginners Guide
Juggling is a lot of fun right? You have probably started with juggling balls and now want fresh challenge. Well I suggest you move on and learn how to juggle with juggling clubs. This is a juggling for beginners guide with a lot of help to illustrate my points from a few extremely talented jugglers.
It does not matter if you have never juggled before but if you have done so with another object like balls you will already know many of the juggling patterns. Either way there is no need to worry as this tutorial is aimed at beginners. So no need to worry if you don’t know anything as these guides aim to get you started right from the very beginning. Also just like when learning to juggle balls we will start with three juggling clubs.
- What is Juggling?
- Learn to Juggle with Three Balls Tutorial
- What is Contact Juggling?
- Learn How to Contact Juggle
What to look for when buying a set of juggling clubs
Before we start you of course need to purchase a set of clubs. If you have the opportunity to go to a shop and handle a few before you buy I would recommend doing so. Clubs tend to look the same but they come in slightly different sizes / lengths. Another consideration is weight as this varies from club to club, there is no perfect weight or size. Fundamentally it boils down to find a club that feels right tossing into the air and catching.
That said if you can’t try before you buy take a look at the customer reviews to see the pros and cons of a particular club.
You can buy juggling equipment in specialist stores in which you can try them but most purchases these days will come from the online retailers. There are many who specialise purely in juggling but you can find a decent set of clubs from Amazon.
Time to start throwing with one club
Take one club and hold it by the handle around the midway point.
Next you will begin to practise throwing the club up in the air and catching it with your other hand. Note the key point to juggling clubs opposed to balls is the club spins. Depending on the height, the higher you throw the more the club will spin or rotate. Obviously you want to catch it with the handle so take some time to experiment with the height until you can regular catch handle first. This may seem a basic step but if you don’t put the practise in here you won’t be juggling any time soon.
To illustrate my point take a look at this video:
Time to get used to throwing and spinning with one club
- Video Source: Niels Duinker YouTube Channel
Moving on to two juggling clubs
Now take a second club, one in each hand now simply throw one club and throw the other club underneath it before it comes down catching each club hopefully handle first. Now you are juggling two clubs!
If you have already learnt to juggle balls then you will be very familiar with this process and only need to factor in the spin of the juggling club. Again practice this as much as you can because you know it will become much harder when we add the third club.
Now take it a step further and keep throwing and catching continuously for around ten throws. Keep practising this until you have it perfected it, don’t worry if you find yourself dropping the clubs it takes a little time to find your rhythm so you always catch handle first.
Take a look at this video to ensure you are performing the throws correctly:
- Video Source:Expert Village YouTube Channel
- Juggler: Isaac Shivers
Now it’s time to add that second club and become comfortable throwing two together
Moving on to three clubs
Right ready to start? Well hold on a moment as this now means you need to hold two clubs in one hand. The way I recommend is to have the two handles crossed. At this point we really do need a visual illustration and thankfully the club juggler featured in these videos does this the same way!
Before we see the video with the two clubs in one hand we now need to throw like we did with the two but add an extra throw. Easy right? Wrong this is very difficult and will almost certainly result in the clubs ending up on the floor. Don’t despair this happened to all the really great jugglers when they were learning. It simply comes down to being persistent, keep practising every for 20 minutes every day if possible.
Right let’s take a look at an expert in action:
- Video Source: Taylor Tries YouTube Channel
- Juggler: Taylor Glenn
And now the moment of truth, three clubs…
Where To Purchase Juggling Clubs
You can find high quality juggling clubs or juggling pins if you prefer from the likes of Amazon or at specialist juggling retailers.
These are affiliate links, Amazon may share a small amount of revenue with us if you buy through one of these links. This has no effect on the price you pay.
Problems you may encounter whilst juggling 3 clubs
Juggling clubs is hard at the beginning you have a lot to concentrate on and seemingly not enough time to do so. Think out about learning to drive a car it’s hard but once learnt it seem relatively easy. You steer, check your mirrors, change gears all without really thinking about and it’s the same when it comes to juggling. Once you start to crack the basics there really is no looking back.
Mastered the basics? Time to learn a few club juggling tricks
Hopefully you have reached the stage where you can continually throw three clubs in comfortable manner. The pattern looks good and flows nicely.
The next thing we need to add is a few juggling tricks or patterns. This is part that gives your juggling the wow factor and will really impress your audiences be they friends or family.
To get there requires learning a particular pattern, once mastered you can add another and then you can move between the two. However let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
I’ll add these couple of videos to give you a few tricks to practice and ones I’m sure you will be able to master. Here the fabulous Taylor Glenn demonstrates the double spin.
You can check of more of her content over on the Youtube channel Taylor Tries plus if you like what you see you can support her via Patreon.
Double Spin
It’s time to add some tricks to your pattern starting with a double spin
The next video comes from Youtube channel Daniel Israel Circus Skater so please check out his channel.
It’s time to add multiple double spins into your pattern, good luck it’s quite tricky
Now to increase the difficulty
Here we will add a triple throw with the aim being that you can mix up your routine going from doubles to adding a triple throw. It’s pretty difficult to pull off but this will give you more flexablity and variations going forward.
Think about it as each new throw you learn can be used later down the line, you are adding to your repertoire. You will be putting everything you have learnt so far into your own routine.
- Video Source:Expert Village YouTube Channel
- Juggler: Isaac Shivers
And it gets harder now we will be adding a triple throw into our pattern
If you familar with juggling balls you will have a head start as next up is learning the juggling pattern ‘Over the top’
And who better to demonstrate this pattern but the outstanding Isaac Shivers.
- Video Source:Expert Village YouTube Channel
- Juggler: Isaac Shivers
Ok time for a different trick, Over the Top
To finish this How To Juggle With Juggling Clubs – A Beginners Guide we will end with the ‘Reverse Cascade’ again with Isaac Shivers.
- Video Source:Expert Village YouTube Channel
- Juggler: Isaac Shivers
The Reverse Cascade looks pretty cool with clubs, take a look
Final Thought – Juggling For Beginners
So that’s it for How To Juggle With Juggling Clubs – A Beginners Guide a big thanks to the talented club juggler you see in these videos, Isaac Shivers. I think you will agree he is very good teacher.
The bottom line is you need to juggle daily at the beginning to conquer the basics if not you will feel like you are starting from scratch every time you do decide to have a go. The result will be you lose interest and cease practicing. You only need allocate 10 or 20 minutes a day and you will soon see improvements through improved hand eye co-ordination and muscle memory. Trust me it will all be worth it when you put together a small routine in front of friends and family.
Oh and don’t worry if you drop a club whilst doing a routine this happens to even the very best, simply start again.
I will be adding another part that covers more complicated and visually impressive tricks. So if you think you are ready for those click here
If you would like to know more general information then head over to the IJA
