How to Do a Backflip on a Trampoline

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This is the classic move everyone wants to be able to do on a trampoline, and you’ll be pleased to hear that it’s very easy and, with the proper instruction (which you’re about to get), you can learn how to do a backflip in all of about 10 minutes or so. I’ve got a few simple steps you that you need to remember to follow, and then a couple of videos demonstrating what to do (they both take very different directions on what to do and how, so I thought I’d include both so you could get two different, but both correct, perspectives and then choose what you like from each). Here we go.

  • BE CAREFUL. It’s recommended that you do this with a someone else present in case you hurt yourself and you’re not capable of calling for help (which you won’t be if your neck is broken and you’re paralyzed). Safety nets around the trampoline are definitely a plus.
  • Start off slowly, doing partial versions of a full-on backflip (the second video does a particularly good job of showing you how to slowly build it up) and then gradually building up to the real deal. Don’t go too high and go a bit sideways at first if you need to (you’ll see what I mean by sideways in the second video): basically you do a back handspring while looking over your shoulder, and then slowly start taking the hands away and turning it into a sort of sideways backflip.
  • Once you start going higher you need to tuck slower than you had to when you were lower.
  • Start off on one side of the trampoline and flip backwards towards the other side to give yourself as much room as possible (but not so close to the springs that they squeak–I’d say you need to be about 2/3s of the way over).

Now for the videos. This first one is fairly short, about 2 1/2 minutes, and just quickly shows you how to do the basic move without a lot of drama:

This second one is about 4 minutes long and does a better job of showing you how to build up to the full backflip:

Additional Resources and Further Reading

If you’ve been doing this on a friend’s trampoline and are thinking about getting one of your own, I highly recommend the Airzone since my friend has one and I know how good it is, plus the Amazon reviews for it are outstanding.

For more trampoline tricks check out tramptricks.com–small community that looks pretty promising, they already have a lot of videos and a fairly active forum. Beyond that I would just say search YouTube for whatever trick you want to do.