What have Dave and Crizzly been up to lately...

I figure this is a blog, so we should use it as such, no? :)

Latest endeavors with clubs include a lot of left hand passing patterns. Basically we're working off a handout I got at a juggling convention a while back. Some of the patterns I can recall at the moment include:

PSSSSPSSSPSSPSPPSPSSPSSSPSSSSPSSSSS or 5count-4count-3count-2count-1count

Martins Mild Madness (a PPS variant where one crosses, the other doesn't, and there's one sync pass-self to confuse everything)

7 club with two ppl as 4count, 3count, 2count, and 1count

a strange six club where you start with (right hand perspective) a double to yourself, then a straight pass, then a crossing, then a self...then you do the same sequence from the left hand. {there's a hidden self pass or two in there to make the passes work, and it has a RRLL moments too, but it all works out}

There's a couple three person patterns we had a chance to do where each person does something different. One easy example is where one person passes outside every other's (like an outside triangle), another does a feed between the other two, and the last does a 2count with one person, but receives clubs from alternating people.

We also did the 3 and 4 person 'clover leaf' or whatever from the IJA newsletter... that's pretty wild too...

Lesse... lately I've been obsessed with juggling trick "chains". Basically, related tricks like:
55550
 5551
  552
   53
    4

or:
     5
    64
   753
  8552
 95551
a55550

...and so on. Obviously there are related chains for any number of balls too. So, one three ball chain would be 3, 42, 531, 6330 which relates to the four ball equivalent chain of 4, 53, 642, 7441, 84440, which relates to the five ball 5, 64, 753, 8552, 95551, a55550. We've been working thru these chains as drills for warmup and such, and discovering other chains of tricks along the way. At some point, I intend on putting a few of these on video for a 'starter pack of tricks', likely focussing on the five ball chains. Here are some other samples of chains for you to try out:

Three ball:
33, 42, 51, 60
33, 3531, 373131, 39313131, ...
51, 7131, 913131, b1313131, ...

Four ball:
44, 53, 62, 71, 80
53, 633, 7333, 83333, 933333, ...
53, 5551, 575151, 59515151, ...
71, 9151, b15151, ...
7171, 919131, b1b13131, ...

Five ball:
55, 64, 73, 82, 91, a0
5, 64, 663, 6662, 66661, 666660
55, 5753, 595353, ...
5555, 5753, 5951
73, 7571, 777171, 79717171, ...
91, b171, d17171, ...
9191, b1b151, d1d15151, ...
91, b171, b1b151, b1b1b131, b1b1b1b111
(notice this is an intersecting chain to the above two)

One can also make interesting chains by taking a large half-shower (say, the seven ball "95"), and repeating enough times to be able to drop one digit to a '1' by removing a ball. OK, that reads confusing, so let me give you an example:

Q: "I want to do a pattern like '95' but with only six balls, so how would I do that?"

A: make either the '9' or the '5' a '1' by subtracting an apropriate number of digits.

Example1: as we should know with siteswaps, one adds up the numbers, and divides by the digits to get the number of balls in a trick, so "95" is (9+5)/2=14/2=7. We can also see that "9595" works just as well (9+5+9+5)/4=28/4=7. To make that last one a 6 ball trick, the total would have to have been 24 {6=24/4=(28-4)/4 ; a difference of 4 which happens to be the number of digits in our repeated pattern}, or in other words, we can change one of the '5's to a '1' like: "9591".

Example2: We could have chosen to convert a '9' to a '1' {difference of 8} in the above example, but we would have to start with "95959595" {8 digits long} so we could subtract eight from a single '9' in there making "95959515".

The above examples could be applied twice to make the seven ball '95' into a 5 ball variant like "9191" and "95951515" (which is a really fun trick to do, btw!), or "95159515" (which is really "9515" twice), or "15959515" (which is a rotation of the first one).

So, I like '73', and applying the above methods, one can get a four ball versions like '71', '7333', '737313' and so on, and then take each of those and apply yet another chaining method such as:
71, 9151, b15151, ...
737313, 93931313, ...
(4, 53, 633,) 7333, 83333, 933333, ...

all of which can get a reduction as well, ie:
9151 -> 5151
b15151 -> b13131
737313 -> 731313
93931313 -> 93131313
83333 -> 33333

...obviously, some lead to trivialities, but then that's expected. :)
A real simple example of this would be taking the basic six ball pattern '666' and removing a single ball to make the five ball pattern '663'... removing another ball yields '633', and yet another leads to '333'... one could follow that down and do three-with-a-hole as '330', and one-in-a-three-pattern as '300', and ultimately no balls doing a '000' which you are doing right now in fact! ;)

So, yeah, have some fun with those ideas. I know it's kinda math heavy, but then, I was a math major in college... lol! If you have questions, just hit me up at the next meeting or invite me out to a chai or somesuch -- I'd be happy to explain it in terms that will help make more sense for you! :D
Cheers! --Crizzly