Jumping Rope

[OakLeaf]

Who's proficient at it? What's your secret?

I'm doing really well if I can jump for 45 seconds without tripping over my cheap vinyl speed rope. Any other type of rope, just forget it.

Part of it is just I need practice. But breathing's an issue too - I know I'm fatiguing way too fast because I'm not breathing properly. It's so different from cycling or running! How should I be breathing when jumping rope???

[Grog]

I can't remember but your post sure makes me feel like getting back to it!

I've always wanted one of those nice jumping ropes with good handles. Maybe now is the time...

I'll maybe get back to you by the end of the weekend!

[Red Rock]

I wish I could remember. I could do this without thinking in elementary school. Now I'm an older, uncoordinated person that can only hike and bike

I think, try to breath "normally" if that makes anysense. Perhaps on the upstroke or the downstroke of the jump. I think the speed affects the breathing too. Perhaps slow down so your not going superfast but somewhere in the middle.

Those are my recollections. I hope they help.

Red Rock

[short cut sally]

They do make weighted jumpropes, which I am a$$uming would make it so your feet don't get tangled up in the rope. I've never used one. I have a rope that has the swivel things where the clothes line type rope is attached to the handles. Which reminds me, I have to dig it out again and give it a try. Thanks for the reminder! It takes a while to build up endurance, as it does with any sport. But it is a great cardio workout. I wish I would've stayed with it a couple of years ago.

[sfa]

I occasionally use my daughter's cotton rope with wooden frog handles from the dollar bin at Target and have never gotten tangled up! My record these days is only ten minutes--nothing like my fifth grade champion record, when my sister and I were the queens of the playground and could pretty much keep going all of recess.

Breathing, hmm, not sure. I never thought about it. The jumping really gets your heart rate up fast, but I think I breathe in time with the jumping. I don't want to practice here in the office to tell you for sure. People would really think I've lost it, but if I pull out the rope this weekend I'll pay attention and see how I breathe.

Sarah

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

I do biking, walking, and occasional winter snowshoeing for exercise, but I keep wanting to find something I'd enjoy that might keep my bones strong. No gym or weightlifting for me, and jogging hurts my ankles too much.
I figured that by jumping rope it would be kind of like jogging but I could jump on both feet at once and thus distribute the impact to my ankles much better. I could also alternate two-feet and one-foot jumping if it went well.
Maybe I'll hate it, but heck I'm willing to give it a try since it's easy to test and jump ropes are cheap. If I can find a decent ceiling height inside, I can do it in the house this winter, another advantage.
We'll see when they arrive. I got a beaded one and another women's one to try out.

[squirrell]

I bought one a few weeks ago and have used it twice so far. I felt good when I made 11 jumps without messing up! I know one thing--my HR shot up in about 30 seconds! Good cardio if you can get it going and keep it for a bit. I plan to do more over the winter.

[Possegal]

When I worked out with a trainer, she was big on the jump rope. I'm pretty good at it but not sure what my secret is, just something I've always been able to do.

I'm going to have to try and get back into that too, now that you bring it up.

[fastdogs]

When I was in korea I continued my taekwondo classes with one of the Korean instructors. He was real big into jump rope, and we all had to get a vinyl jumprope with wooden handles. He had a weighted jumprope, which was like a punishment to have to use. It wasn't just weighted handles- the rope part was weighted. If it hit you when you missed, it HURT.
I have one of the "ropeless jumpropes". It makes a jumprope sound as it turns, and has little weighted oval balls on a short string that you twirl around, which sort of let you know if you aren't making good rotations because they'll hit you in the hand if you aren't. It counts rotations and will make a tone when you've completed the time you set. It's good for doing in the house, when you are doing workout tapes that use a jumprope like cathy smith's boxing workout (really good workout) or the newer biggest winner series of dvds.
vickie

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

UPDATE:
So after trying a beaded rope and a vinyl rope, I settled on this one which I like very much:
Danskin jump rope
I had to shorten it somewhat to fit me, but that's how they intend it- it comes 9' (which is long enough for someone 6'2") and you get to shorten it to suit you. I removed the weights from inside the handles for now. It is very sturdy and has a nice weight to the 'rope'. I had to unbend the fold kinks from it and sort of work it straight. Hanging it on the wall helps that too.

I think this is going to work for me! After a few days of stumbling about and stepping on the rope by accident every 5-10 jumps at first, I am getting better at it each day and find this to be rather fun now! The less I trip up the rope, the more fun it is. Holy cow though...it REALLY gets your heart going! I still have to do 20 second mini-rests every 30 jumps or so.
This is something that is easy and quick and fun for me to do a couple times a day as I pass by the rope hanging in the laundry area, maybe 100 jumps each time. As I build up my endurance I hope to do about 300 jumps in one session, maybe every other day. I know this will be excellent for preventing bone loss in the future.

[Aggie_Ama]

This seems like a fun way to pass the gross winter days. I think I will look for a rope.

[alpinerabbit]

Oh Gods.

every 3 months or so, my upstairs neighbor (I think she's a nurse so she works odd hours) decides to have a go at exercise, and starts skipping.

a couple weeks ago, she did it from 6:10 am to 6:40 am. WTF????????
I did NOT feel like dragging my azz upstairs in my pyjamas to tell her to stop

[Aggie_Ama]

And this is why we bought a house. Our last apartment had an extremely heavy walker (not that big of a guy just thudded when he walked) who worked the night shift as a manager at McDonalds. He kept odd hours and drove my light sleeping husband insane. He also vacuumed- a lot.

[eclectic]

I am glad to hear others are bumbling along trying to jumprope
Our Y just completed a great new circuit training area and one of the aerobic stations is to jumprope for a minute - "NO problemo I thought
I was WRONG ! ! !

First of all my jumprope style has diminshed incredibly in 40 years AND I am way taller and way heavier than i was 40 years ago AND I can't jump or hop anymore (except to Polka

I too would jumprope for hours on wonderful spring days when I was a child - What happened

I do have a "professional" type adult jumprope I too will now have to dig out. The 3 times i tried it for a total of about 3 min it worked well. It is one of the rope ones, not vinyl, and has the swivel ballbearing handles.

One of the tricks I DO know is the rope has to be the right length for your height.

Start slow and gradually add speed as you get better at it.

I do the 2 foot hop, one where one foot stays as lead all the time,(kind of rocking) or the one that is actually "skipping" where you alternate feet.
the 2 foot hop is the most difficult IMHO and gets the HR up the quickest.

Cinderella dressed in yellow went downstairs to kiss her fellow . . .

Bubblegum bubblegum in a dish . . .

Tinker, tailor, soldier, sailor, rich,man, poor man . . .

Go play everyone!

[OakLeaf]

Well to be fair, when we were kids it was two hops to one revolution of the rope, and then at the end of the rhyme it doubled to one hop per revolution and you counted how many you could do - what was that called?? "How many alligators were In That Purse?" I forget how high we used to get to but it wasn't over 50-60 I don't think.