Forums > Beginner Poi Moves > How to keep planes in flowers

Posted: 7th May 2009
How are your planes when you just use your arms, draw some lines on the ground and find out, you might find that you're throwing it out by not turning your body enough. If your arms are fine and its just your poi going wacky then try the exercise below, perhaps. Its about overall plane control.


Using one, try learning to bend your planes toward you at the front, away from you at the front, toward you at the top and away from you at the top (front and top of the rotation)

And then try learning to do that at different positions, stick your hand out behind you.

Posted: 7th May 2009
Thanks for the reply,

It seems to be just my poi going a little iffy, thanks for the excersise i'll give it a go

Posted: 7th May 2009
You could also use a poi in one hand and move the other as though you were spinning a flower. See what happens then?

'We're all mad here. I'm mad, you're mad." [said the Cat.]
"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the Cat, "Or you wouldn't have come here."
- Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures In Wonderland

Posted: 8th May 2009
Maybe try practicing against a flat wall. Stand right next to it so your poi is basically brushing the wall and practice your flowers one arm at a time. The wall gives you direct feedback about when you poi deviate and you can work to correct it. This little trick did my flowers wonders
EDITED_BY: Mr_Joe (1241726875)

Posted: 8th May 2009
I did a search on Youtube for a poi warm up video, and you'll get this guy giving a stretch routine he pretty much set up to learn and prepare to perform flowers.




I think this might help, I'm gonna start using it this weekend.

Posted: 8th May 2009
i keep keep my arms long kind of like i do in swimming ( i don't know if that makes any sense.)

another thing that helps is when you right hand is infront of you have your chest turned as far to the left as you can and when the left hand is infront have your chest facing the right

watching burning dan helps me a lot
hope this helps some

Posted: 8th May 2009
I found when learning basic flowers that each flower has its own dependant muscle moves in order to maintain steady planes, forward same time poi/split time arms feels very different to me than split time poi/split time arms.

I concentrated more on moving into and out of the actual flower for a couple of revolutions rather than continuously carrying out the same motion as I found myself allowing the rhythm of the poi to actually cause the mistakes for me.

The reason for this was that I was focussing on maintaining a solid wrist direction, ( believing that by trying to keep my wrists in the same place throughout the flower would keep the planes aligned ), whereas the wrists are required to be totally flexible throughout a single revolution of the flower.

I'm still a beginner outright with poi but I can only offer what little advice helped me.

Relax your wrists and focus on the poi plane rather than worrying about your arms at the start, your arms will/should naturally straighten the more time you spend on each flower.

Work on one flower at a time until you nail it

Antispin.....thats a whole new ball game, brain + logic = spagetti lol

GL and when you get it, post some pics with glowpoi Pics with glowpoi show you exactly when your wrists and arms are going wrong, I've learnt loads from my 2-3 second delay pics and just looking at the path of the heads and where the symmetry breaks in the flower.

Posted: 8th May 2009
Thanks for all the help, Everything has been really useful, I think i've just about got it now, i just need a few (thousand) years of practice! LOL!

Originally Posted By: Gresk

Antispin.....thats a whole new ball game, brain + logic = spagetti lol



Yeah, don't even get me started on anti-spin, that just leads to more bruises:)

Posted: 10th May 2009
Once it clicks, anti-spin is actually quite natural. I tend to do anti-spin more than prospin flowers now.

'We're all mad here. I'm mad, you're mad." [said the Cat.]
"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the Cat, "Or you wouldn't have come here."
- Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures In Wonderland

Posted: 11th May 2009
* Let your shoulders be loose and relaxed
* Pinch your chain or handle
* Do a 10-50 pedal flower in the beginning
* Move your feet, when left arm is infront of you then the left foot should be infront as well, the fewer pedals the faster foot work.
* Practice with two poi, if you hit yourself remember that weak point in the flower and fix it for next try, focus and presence
* Spin slow
* Sometimes it helps if you close your eyes, don´t spin with your eyes to much, you have 5 senses, use them and especially when spinning.
* Don´t stress

Keep spinning , more bruises ,make sure to enjoy
EDITED_BY: 16.15.8=Passion! (1242034402)

"I don´t like shoes, definitely not spinning with shoes, they make my feet feel flat, my feet are not flat...."

Posted: 15th May 2009
Thanks, they are getting better its just having the right weather and enough time to practice now!