Windmill
Windmill
Prerequisites
Coindrop
Optional
some breaking experience
The windmill is a basic powermove in breaking. It flows really well into tricking combos and will teach you how to swing your legs in other breaking powermoves.
To keep it simple, just look at it as continuous coindrops without actually getting up.
01 Handglide Freeze
This is called a Handglide or one-handed Turtle Freeze. You can enter the Windmill from multiple ways, like from standing or from a different trick / move. The Handglide Freeze is the position you’ll end up in after each round, so we’ll start from here first.
Place your dominant arms elbow onto the side of your abdomen and your other hand slightly off to the side of your head for balance.
Your stabbing arm should push against the floor to reduce the amount of weight on your abdomen.
02 Floating
Try to lift your legs off the floor.
You can tuck your legs in to make this step easier. Keep your head off the ground and keep breathing! A lot of beginners will hold their breath, when they start to learn freezes. Breathing will allow you to control the movement better and to hold it longer.
03 Straddle
Now try to hold the freeze for a brief amount of time with both legs straight and straddled. This can be quite hard and you don't have to hold this position for long, since you'll only be in this position for a fraction of a second in a windmill.
04 to baby freeze
This little transition between these two freezes is the first part of the windmill. Get into your Handglide Freeze with both feet on the floor, legs straight and straddled.
Wind up with your legs slightly and then lift up your first leg high, so your swinging leg can pass through underneath.
This is where it’s important to push against the floor with your stabbing arm. You will need that push to lift up your body from your elbow, turn a bit and then restab.
The upswing from your first leg will also help you a lot to make this step a lot easier. It shouldn’t require much strength to go from the Handglide Freeze to the Baby Freeze.
Your Head will be lowered to the ground when you swing your backleg up and enter the Baby Freeze. But that’s just for counterbalance. There should be next to no weight on the side of your head. It should be all on your hands.
05 add a push
To enter the Windmill from the baby freeze position, you’ll need to collapse and push off with your stabbing arm. As you push off, your legs are being swung around straight, to create the spinning momentum. If done right, you should spin on the upper part of your back.
Don't swing too early or else you won't generate spinning momentum. Lift up your first leg high and then kick with your other in the direction of the opposite shoulder.
06 Star kip to freeze
If you know how to get up from a coindrop, this should be easy. It’s the same motion that is used to complete the first and enter the second windmill. Sit on your butt with one leg behind and the other straight in front.
Swing your backleg to the front and across, while at the same time you lower your upper body down, so you’ll end up on your upper back.
As soon as your back makes contact with the floor, swing your other leg up high too. You want to swing that leg upwards and round, back to the floor. Your first leg will then pass through underneath.
Try to roll over back into the handglide freeze.
07 One windmill
What’s really good about this move is that you can practice it slowly and step by step.
Enter your handglide freeze.
Wind up slightly.
Transition into a baby freeze.
Collapse and push off onto your upper back instead.
Swing your legs into a Star Kip.
Back into Handglide Freeze.
Practice this until you can do it in one fluid motion. One fluid windmill.
08 restab windmill
Now that you’re able to do one Windmill it’s time to learn continuous ones. Start out with doing one windmill after another. You can pause and take your time after each one. Just get used to multiple singular windmills in a row.
Work on reducing the pause between each windmill. As soon as you restab into your elbow push off with it again into the next windmill. Kick into the next windmill as soon as you restab. Your legs should feel like “Kick-swinging-Kick-swinging-Kick-swinging…”.
And then try to keep your feet off the floor the whole time.
09 Headmills
Windmills where you restab after each round to swing into the next are the most basic form of them. However you can also learn other variations after that and the most basic variation would be the headmill. In the headmill you don't restab, but instead you roll over your forehead to make way for your legs. They can also be considerably faster, since you don't have to 'pause' in between each round. Practice this variation of soft surface or with a hat on first, just to be safe.
Tips
Breaking Powermoves can be very frustrating to learn, if you progress slow but the payoff is well worth it. In tricking you just land the trick and it's landed, but you don't just 'land' a b-boy powermove. You slowly improve it. Always record your sessions. The ability to analyze your own mistakes is invaluable.
You can enter the windmill from a lot of tricks like transformer, scoot or coindrops.
Always stay on the upper part of your back. If you spin on the lower part of your back, you'll have a lot of trouble to continue into the second round.
Force yourself to keep both legs straight the whole time. And use them actively. Remember the kick-swing-kick-swing motion.