Hi guys,
One person privately asked a good question about the tail during the drop. Here is a description of the tail placement during the drop that might be helpful for some of you!
-As you know when you start the drop the tail is on the left side of your body. As your body rotates into the back dive position, you want to continue to reach that left hand holding the tail towards that same direction it starts in… so that left arm actually reaches over the belly towards the right side as you face the pole to do the back dive portion. So imagine trying to keep the tail in the same spot, the body rotates but the left arm continues to reach in that same direction so the body folds into the arm, with the goal being to keep the tail relatively in the same place in space. Watch the video of Mizuki dropping a bunch of times.. if you look at where both her arms are right before she does the back dive portion, her left arm is reaching across her belly towards the right in order to hold the tail away from her body. Keeping the tail in relatively the same place during the rotations keeps your momentum going strong. If the tails start to fly around it will slow you way down and also they may get caught on your leg(s).
