Before you try anything like this, you have to be completely confident with monkey vaults. You are basically diving over the most part of the obstacle and hitting as close to the end of the obstacle with your hands as possible to make sure you clear it successfully. There is no margin for error with this kind of technique, so if you don’t feel ready to do it, then don’t. It isn’t a great Idea to bottle out half way either, so if you are going for it, do exactly that, and don’t back out at the last second. This is a really fun and useful technique to learn though, and the hang time while you are diving is great.
|
|
| Click the photo (above) to download a video of this technique.
|
In this frame I have conveniently come across some nicely positioned walls. This dive kong is over a gap, so there is a bit more of a fear factor. You might want to start off trying this on a picnic table over some grass to help your confidence.
|
|
|
Now I am running into this kong with a fair amount of speed, which just helps to ensure you make the distance. I have just run toward the wall and done a small ‘hop’, planted my feet about a foot in front of the first wall to make sure that I don’t clip it with my feet, and begun to jump into a dive. |
|
|
You really want to dive into it at this point, so think of it as a curving dive into a normal kong. You want to jump forward and up, not just forward because your speed from the run up will carry you over the obstacle anyway. My arms have come forwards ready to connect with the wall. |
|
I’m mid-way through the dive at this point. My knees have started to tuck in more, and my arms fully extended to ensure that my hands are placed firmly on the wall. This is where you get some hang time and really have the feeling of floating over, so enjoy it!
|
|
|
My dive has brought my into a nice inverted position when my hands connect with the wall here. This is good as it ensures that you don’t clip your feet (and often looks a bit prettier too). My arms begin to bend, and directly after my hands hit the wall, my knees become tucked into my chest and come forward rapidly to catch up with the rest of my body. |
|
Now bring your legs through! If you don’t your body weight is likely to be off balance and you will get thrown forward face first. Your arms should become straight again, and as your legs come through between your arms, you should naturally let go of the wall. In this frame my right leg is coming through faster than my left, so that I can land split footed and straight into a run. This way I lose almost no forward momentum from the dive.
|
|
|
I have landed with my right foot, and gone straight into a run to maintain the speed. This bit is up to you really, but if you are doing this from height you want to land with two feet and either roll or bend your legs on impact and slap the floor with your hands to transfer the shock. Now give yourself a pat on the back, you’ve just landed a kong. |
|
Variations
This technique opens up a lot of opportunities for some really creative movements. Again, these are great fun, and defiantly worth learning. Some simple variations are to come out on two feet or split footed (one foot after the other) and go straight into a run. You can also go into the kong off one foot, which tends to better the fluidity of the technique because there is no hop needed. Going into the kong diagonally can be a lot of fun too.
Double kong-This is very similar to the dive kong, however you tap the obstacle twice with your hands. The first tap is better described as a push. As you start to dive into the kong, you place our hands on the obstacle and push up to hopefully gain more height and distance on the dive. As you are diving your hands shift forward and connect with the furthest part of the obstacle, and you finish as you would a normal kong. The best way to think of this is that it is a normal dive kong, so concentrate on really diving still, but push off on the first part of the obstacle before you become ‘air-born’.
Level kong-This is a good technique to learn to add a bit of variety, and to maintain some speed. Again this is pretty much the same as the dive kong, only you are connecting with the wall with your hands at the same horizontal level as your feet are taking off from. This takes a little working up to, so start by konging over a small ‘gap’, and work up to increasing the size of the dive. These are fairly easy to learn once you have the kong down.
Kong to precision- Pretty simple really. This is just a normal kong where you land in a precise spot, like a wall or a rail coming out of the kong.
Kong to cat- Again this is just a normal kong where your momentum carries you forward straight out of the kong and into a cat leap all in one movement.
|
