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Yo-Yo Wizards

Young people from around the world show off mind-blowing yo-yo tricks

A young woman leaning back slightly while swinging a gold yo-yo upwards, against a pink background

YoYo Factory

2019 World Yo-Yo Champion  Betty Gallegos

As you read, think about the forces that allow yo-yo pros to perform their routines.

Betty Gallegos was 12 years old when she and her mom stumbled across a yo-yo competition in a park near their home in Mexico City. Gallegos watched in awe as participants whipped spinning yo-yos into the air and looped the strings around their fingers and arms.  

Afterward, Gallegos’s mom bought her a yo-yo. She practiced for years to master the stunts she’d seen—and some she came up with herself. Today, Gallegos, now 22, is part of a community of more than 10,000 competitive yo-yoers. They teach tricks using online videos and compete at national and international events.

During competitions, yo-yoers like Gallegos perform routines to music. Judges award points for artistry, difficulty, and execution. It takes a lot of skill and practice. Competitors also get help from specially designed yo-yos. These high-tech devices can spin faster and longer than average yo-yos, allowing for spectacular stunts!

Three separate images of yo-yoers swinging yo-yos around their fingers and arms

Matej Divizna/Getty Images

Here are some of the amazing tricks pulled off by competitive yo-yoers at a recent event. From left to right: The Horizontal Reverse Brother Hop, The Arm Gentry Hop (named after Gentry Stein, shown here), and The Upside Down Eli Hop.

Yo-Yo Basics

After watching her first competition, Gallegos began attending free yo-yo lessons with a group called the Mexican Yo-Yo Association. “There, I started to learn basic tricks like the Sleeper,” she says. In this simple move, the yo-yo keeps spinning at the end of its string. It’s the first step in any professional routine.

To make a yo-yo “sleep,” Gallegos throws it toward the ground. As the yo-yo leaves her hand, it has stored because of its position, explains Maria Holland, an engineer at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana. The force of pulls the yo-yo down toward Earth. The potential energy turns into , the energy of motion.

Inside the yo-yo, the end of the string is looped around an . The rest of the string is wrapped around it. As the yo-yo falls, the string unwinds from the axle. When the yo-yo reaches the end of the string, Gallegos is careful not to pull the yo-yo up. If she does the trick just right, the axle keeps turning inside the loop of string.

To “wake” the yo-yo, Gallegos gives the string a quick tug. That creates , a rubbing force, between the string and the axle. The yo-yo winds back up the string to Gallegos’s hand, ready for her next trick.

High-Tech Design

During a yo-yo contest, Gallegos has just a few minutes to wow the judges. To earn the most points, she needs to do as many tricks as possible while the yo-yo sleeps. If the yo-yo’s spinning slows down, Gallegos will have to bring it back up and toss it again, losing precious time she could spend performing the next stunt.

Competition yo-yos are designed to sleep longer than regular yo-yos. Toy yo-yos are made of wood or plastic and have a solid axle. These yo-yos quickly slow as friction builds between the axle and the string. “Every time it spins, friction steals energy from the yo-yo,” explains Holland. 

Pro yo-yos are made of lightweight aluminum. Weights on their edges help them keep rotating. Circling the axle is a device called a ball bearing (see Yo-Yo Designs, page 13). It consists of two rings—one larger than the other—with tiny metal balls between them. The yo-yo string wraps around the outer ring. The metal spheres help the inner ring spin smoothly with the axle. That reduces friction, keeping the yo-yo sleeping much longer. 

Betty Gallegos in Action
Watch a video about a teen performing complex yo-yo tricks.

Working to Win

In April 2019, Gallegos became the first woman to win the Mexican National YoYo Championship. She then spent all summer preparing her routine for the World YoYo Contest held in August 2019 in Cleveland, Ohio. Gallegos was one of more than 200 yo-yoers from 21 countries. Her competitors were some of the best yo-yoers in the world, so Gallegos knew her routine needed to be amazing. She worked on it every night for up to three hours. “I couldn’t go to sleep knowing that I hadn’t practiced that day,” she says.

At the competition, Gallegos went head-to-head against eight other yo-yoers in the women’s division finals. When it was her turn to perform, she twirled and flipped her pink yo-yo as the crowd cheered. 

When the results were announced, “I couldn’t believe it,” says Gallegos. She’d won first place! “In that moment, I knew all the hard work was worth it,” she says. “It was a dream come true.” Gallegos now teaches what she’s learned to other kids—so they might someday become yo-yo pros too.

kinetic energy

the energy of an object in motion

gravity

the force that pulls an object toward another object

potential energy

stored energy due to an object’s position in space

axle

a rod that passes through a wheel or group of wheels

friction

a force that resists movement caused when two surfaces rub together

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