How to Touchdown Raiz

The Touchdown Raiz (td_raiz) looks like a Raiz with one hand touching the ground.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zVFoTJl22s

The problem I had with the td_raiz was uncertainty:

There are many ways to approach the td_raiz, yet all of them can end up looking like a touchdown raiz. This drove me nuts. I kept thinking there were "real" and "fake" touch down raizes. I had a lot of uncertainties about the td_raiz:

• Do I just think raiz with one hand down?


• Is the takeoff the same as the raiz?


• Is it okay if the touchdown is just a "touching of the ground" ?


• Or does the touchdown hand need to provide support?


• Is it like a gainer for any reason?


• Is it a one handed backhandspring with a slight spin at takeoff?


• How floaty should it be? Should it float at all?


• Am I actually doing td_raiz?


• Surely this approach isn't right? It is? Something is wrong.


• Everybody else does it like nothing, why can't I?


• Is it supposed to be easy?


• I'm not doing it right. Am I? Maybe I am doing it right?


• It looks good, but is it really it?


• All this uncertainty paralyzed me and killed my motivation.

How I adjusted my td_raiz psychology:

First, I stopped doubting my td_raizes. I stopped asking myself whether or not any of my td_raiz attempts counted. I stopped asking myself whether or not I was doing my td_raiz correctly. I stopped being picky about the cleanliness of the trick. I stopped thinking there was only one-omnipotent-penultimate-final-best-way to think about the td_raiz.

Second, I started thinking of the td_raiz as a setup movement instead of a trick. Like a hook kick, j-step or spin hop; Nobody beats themselves up over whether or not their j-step setup "counts" or is "clean", people use the j-step to enter gainers; They JUST DO IT, and make incremental unconscious changes to their gainer. Thus, I measured my td_raiz success based on whether it was "working for me" or "not working for me" in a combo.

Third, I created some combos that I could use the td_raiz for that would be personally satisfying. I was never excited about the td_raiz until I invented my own combos for it. The prospect of learning the td_raiz seemed to always end in s/t cork/boxcutter/double spin tricks. I don't do these type of tricks because I don't want to. Why learn the td_raiz if the only things it would be useful for were things I didn't give a fuck about? So inventing my own combos motivated me to use it!

Working on the td_raiz

So after I overcame the psychological goblins of the td_raiz, I began to use the trick for combos. Working on the td_raiz in combos improved it more than working on it in isolation. I wrote something about drilling tricks in the context of combos on this page, so yeah, I found that idea especially useful for td_raiz.

My recommendations for you

I would first check to see if you would benefit from adjusting your td_raiz psychology the same way I did described above. When someone gives you specific technical instructions for the td_raiz, don't accept it as TRUTH. If their technique frustrates you, just log it away and try something else instead. This trick is fairly open ended compared to other tricks I've played with. It's very forgiving, so it can become confusing when you find several ways to do it, but they all end up the same. Don't give up, just keep doing them and you'll become unconsciously competent with them.