How did you first get into yo-yoing? What fascinated you about it?

Thanks for sharing. :man_juggling::ok_hand:

It all started last summer with a low quality auto return yo-yo given in given gift bags. As a started throwing it I realized it was sort of therapeutic, this feeling quickly went away since the yo-yo’s internal mechanism had broken after half an hour. After it broke someone else gave me theirs but it broke just the same. I had remembered from when I was young my uncle used to talk about Duncan, so I bought a cheap Butterfly at a local supermarket. It worked well enough then I looked up the website that was on its packaging; the website was old and dated I thought yo-yoing was dying out. Then I found a Butterfly XT through another supermarket… wow a whole new world with a ball bearing. Soon after I started looking up tutorial videos which caused me to stumble upon YoYoExpert’s site. I did not know there were different styles of play and so many companies out there! Fast forward to now, I own a nice collection of different brands and just figured out the Kwijibo on Andre’s Tutorials. It’s my relaxing hobby since I took a break from the expensive hobby of modifying and working on my car. I don’t think I would have been as interested if I hadn’t found this community so thank you!

-bbdave-

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1988 my Grandpa gave my cousin and I each a Smothers Brothers yoyo (can’t believe these were $3 new! What a steal). He also had recorded a number of Smothers Brothers shows to show us them playing with yoyos and the tricks. Whenever we stayed with my Grandparents they tried to teach us things, and have fun. Trips to museums, working in Grandpa’s shop, watching documentaries, etc. I guess my Grandpa enjoyed yoyos when he was younger, and thought his grandsons should know about them. So we sat that weekend super excited to learn tricks, and were amazed watching the Smothers perform on their show. I still own that yoyo, and played with it for years.

Fast forward to the yoyo boom in the mid 90’s I got a Spintastics Tornado, and a ProYo II. The ProYo I bought because ProYo was coming to town and the contest they were holding you had to use a fixed axle, and that was the recommended yoyo. Saved up that year and bought a Turbo Bumble Bee, which I loved and still use to this day. Was amazed and the things you could do with them. At that time I was pretty much only interested in learning picture tricks. Then started watching the Sector Y videos from '99-01. Then got real heavy into inline skating and playing guitar and put my yoyo’s down for the most part.

Fast forward to 2013 I wanted to see if people were still playing with yoyo’s and did a search online and found a video of Hiroyuki Suzuki and my jaw hit the ground. Did some more searching and found YYE.

I don’t know if I’ve been “fascinated” by yoyo’s. They’ve almost always been around, and I enjoy learning and playing. I especially like playing responsive, seeing how far I can push that, I like the challenge.

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I think it’s amazing there is a yoyo school ! Does Andre teach there ? I see it’s in Massachusetts. I want to take lessons !!

Good story. I can totally relate. All the tutorial videos certainly keep me going too. I’d have no idea how to learn otherwise.

Thanks for sharing. Each story is unique and original. I could do a short movie about this stuff.

Andre sometimes does teach at yoyo school. I have a video of him teaching my 10 year old daughter Brain Twister. Yoyo school is great, there are so many talented yoyo players in western MA, it is almost surreal seeing people like Andre or Eric Koloski teaching kids gravity pull (in case you were wondering, both of them are really good at gravity pull). Everyone is welcome at yoyo school, no one cares if you are throwing the latest unobtanium masterpiecs or the most basic yoyo, everyone is there to share their knowledge and welcome you to the community.

If you ever get to a contest where YoYo Expert has a booth, make sure you go and introduce yourself. Andre and his team are some of the nicest, most humble and welcoming people I’ve ever met.

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The first time I took an interest in yoyos was 9 yrs ago when this group called “NED” came to my elementary school and did this show with yoyos along with a nice message for kids. After that the school was selling those “NED” yoyos and the whole school had one except me, my parents thought it was a waste of money (they should see me now).
Fast forward a couple months I bought this triple action yoyo in the mall with my birthday money and it was a great yoyo but I didn’t really get to learn any tricks therefore I forgot about the yoyo in a couple of weeks.
Now when i became a senior in highschool the whole kendama craze started going around about 2 years ago now and everyone at school had a kendama, i thought I didn’t really want to be like the rest so I remembered my old yoyo and decided to find it through my old stuff. I found it but it was pretty much broken, so I googled yoyos and came up with yoyotricks on YouTube and from there I bought my first ball bearing yoyo, the sage. From yoyotricks I started to learn all their basic tricks on YouTube and picked up on it pretty fast then I bought my first unresponsive yoyo from yoyoexpert. from there I became obsessed over it for a while, you know that stage everyone goes through where one must have all the yoyos they can possibly have. I later realized one just needs one good yoyo to enjoy the hobby but one or two more never hurt someone.

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Long story short I was at toys r us with my parents and saw a bright red yoyo and asked my parents to buy it for me because I really wanted to see how many times I could make it go up and down ::slight_smile:

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Originally got into it in the 90s like every other 12 year old, lol. Picked it up again a few years ago after getting off drugs and booze. Needed something to focus on and fill all the free time i had at the time. Dont really want to get into it any deeper on here. But it was good for me at the time. And i still throw every day.

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I was bamabino (eighties) I used to play with classic wooden yoyo … then I stopped. In 2009, an evening like many others, I was in the office and there suddenly came the desire to buy a yoyo, because for decades not seen one, they first came out and I went to buy a wooden yoyo (€ 2.5! ;D) in a toy store, and until that moment I did not know how totally this toy and the way of using it were so deeply changed.
Since I am curious by nature, a few hours later I started to search the internet and … I opened up a new world that still fascinates me today !!!

Got one for Easter and wonder what else can you do with a yoyo,week later got a good throw but wasn’t enough so looked online and got a fast201 then I got obsessed and now I have 52 yoyo’ a so this April will be 1 year of Yoyoing.

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I had a friend in middle school who had a Yomega Fireball. I had to get one of those (because middle school) then, around Christmas, there was a guy throwing B.C. Yoyos at a mall kiosk. I was fascinated by what he was doing, begged my dad to get me one.

I threw those B.C. wooden throws and random Duncan Imperials and Butterflies for 20 years. Wore out the B.C.s and when I went online to look for more, found out what yo-yo is today. Here I am.

You must be pretty good with a wooden fixed axel then! :slight_smile:

I can remember seeing the yomegas in the 90s and being totally drawn to them. I thought they looked so cool, I just loved the look of the translucent plastic bodies. No doubt why I still love the look today. We didn’t have any money back then, so I would ride my bike to gas stations around the house and dig through the vacuum cleaners at the car washes and scrounge up all the change that people sucked up off their floorboards (a method of obtaining cash that I would later use quite regularly). Eventually I had enough change to pick up a Brain, and man did I wear that thing out. Just throwing sleepers, seeing how long I could make it sleep and excitedly wait for it to return. Eventually my dad asked me if I could do walk the dog, rock the baby, etc and that got me into trying tricks, which at the time I didn’t even know you could do with a yoyo. That was the beginning for me. A little later, freshman year in high school, we had the opportunity to use a yoyo for a physics project, and I picked up a cherry bomb. I remember thinking that thing was an engineering marvel with its bearing lol.

I went to a local toy store to buy something for my son. Then I saw a Duncan Imperial. I bought the Imperial. I forgot that I went there to buy a toy for my son. ;D

When I was 10 my brother bought me a Yomega Brain as a gag gift for Christmas. To throw it back in his face I ended up playing with it non stop for months. But never touched a yoyo again once it broke no even a year later. It wasn’t until I was 15 going on 16 till I saw my first moderns yoyo. I was in a band with a bunch of older kids. One night while finishing a band practice I noticed that my singer had brought a yoyo with him to practice. With him being a weird person to begin with I thought nothing of it, but once he started doing tricks I realized there was a lot more then just Walk the Dog with this thing. So curiously I asked about it and that’s when I was given my first yoyo a good ol DV888 from Yoyo Factory. I spent hours learning how to do bind return and once I got that down I realized how much fun it was and how much I enjoyed advancing with this toy. I yoyo’d for about a year then quit after due to all my friends I did yoyo with moving away or quitting. Almost 4 years later summer of 2016 I picked it back up, since then it’s all I can think about it’s all I want to do and I’m improving more and more each day! I don’t know why I stopped to be completely honest but I’m regretful that I did. If I just kept with it I wouldn’t have all these years to catch up! Buy I like the idea of learning new tricks, and creating ones of my own. To me yo-yoing is something more then a toy, it’s apart of my life. It’s something I will always keep with me and want to do. It’s like my own way of keeping in touch with my inner child. Because yoyo is all about fun. I don’t care if I win the next contest or I’m getting hella money with them yoyo royalties (Which I know there isn’t much money in the Professional Yoyoing world) I’d prefer to just throw some headphones in and get lost in the many many tricks and elements that is yo-yoing today!!

Heck yeah ! Tight ! I feel the same way. Yoyoing is the bomb. Getting lost in it is the best !

:muscle::+1:

Had a fireball in HS. Fast forward a decade and a half. Went to FYE since they were closing down. Picked up a fireball and a maverick both for 12 bucks. Went on YouTube to learn new tricks. Found out they’re responsive yoyos. So I quickly got bored of those. Picked up a pop star, dv888, and a replay pro. Always carry one with me, couldn’t put it down ever since. I’m a super noob when it comes to throwing. Even a simple bind without knotting the string still makes me smile.