Speaker 1: M Hey, everybody, it's Josh and for this week's select,
Speaker 1: I've chosen a member of our surprisingly extensive circus art suite,
Speaker 1: our episode on knife throwing, thanks to Laverne and Shirley.
Speaker 1: I always thought it was a gimmick, not actually real,
Speaker 1: but boy, did this episode open my eyes. I hope
Speaker 1: it opened your eyes too, to the awesomeness of knife throwing. Enjoy.
Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark.
Speaker 1: There's Charles Chuck Bryant, and there's this stuff you should
Speaker 1: all right, this bears some explanation. So I was doing
Speaker 1: my Stevie from Malcolm in the Middle of Impression, which
Speaker 1: one is Stevie. He was the kid in the wheelchair
Speaker 1: who's like breathed like that, who talked like that because
Speaker 1: he he had serious asthma. Yeah, he remember him. Was
Speaker 1: he just like a classmate? Yeah? He was like his
Speaker 1: best friend, I believe I remember. I like, I like
Speaker 1: that show that. Yeah, well that's not what I was doing. Really. No,
Speaker 1: we're slightly out of breath because we just had a
Speaker 1: fire alarm. Yeah, we had to walk down four stairs
Speaker 1: four flights of stairs and not like this, the one,
Speaker 1: the kind of flight where it's like down, landing down again,
Speaker 1: the two flights. Yeah, so we walked down eight flights
Speaker 1: of stairs and then walked back eight more. Right when
Speaker 1: we got down, stopped and immediately turned around to go
Speaker 1: back in. It was ridiculous. It was the kind of
Speaker 1: thing that makes you say, maybe I will only next time.
Speaker 1: It was a fire alarm. I was prepared to hide
Speaker 1: in the studio and keep working. Yeah, we thought about it,
Speaker 1: but there's a fire marshal who works here, so you
Speaker 1: can't can't run a foul him. Man, he got on
Speaker 1: that orange best quick changes everything. So I ever heard
Speaker 1: of those guys that sneak into places with those vests? Yes,
Speaker 1: I have, I don't is there a name for what
Speaker 1: I think these? I'm sure more than one person has
Speaker 1: done this, But there's these two guys in particular who
Speaker 1: uh kind of got I don't know about famous, but
Speaker 1: made a name for themselves for putting on the orange
Speaker 1: vests and saying basically like, if you wear one of these,
Speaker 1: you can get in anywhere you want. Amost, if you
Speaker 1: have orange vest on, you look like you're supposed to
Speaker 1: be there. Well, yeah, you gotta have that steely sense
Speaker 1: of nerve and Alwaukie talkie is probably a good thing
Speaker 1: to have to Yeah, but they can go anywhere because
Speaker 1: the orange vest guy that means that's something's wrong in
Speaker 1: the orange vest guy has to take care of it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like they showed pictures in the in front of a
Speaker 1: I can't remember what show it was, but a big,
Speaker 1: big concert where they were in that buffer area between
Speaker 1: the people in the stage, right, yeah, and fred Durst
Speaker 1: is like, oh, there's an orange guest, the best guy.
Speaker 1: Something must be going on. What year was a h
Speaker 1: This would been two thousand two maybe the fred Dorst
Speaker 1: ears Great Years, the Wonder Years. Right, Well, man, I'm
Speaker 1: hot now too. I'm I feel good. I got like that,
Speaker 1: got the endorphins fall and this is gonna be a
Speaker 1: cool episode, buddy. Well the irony is I so grossly
Speaker 1: out of shape. I started getting on the peloton yeah
Speaker 1: last week, so I've been and this is not a
Speaker 1: plug for pellets, I guess it is, but it's not
Speaker 1: an ad, but I've been getting on that thing. So
Speaker 1: my legs are ham rubber rubber band hams right now. Anyway, Yeah, Hey,
Speaker 1: y'all prepare yourself for the rubber band ham. That's hey,
Speaker 1: will you indulge me for one moment? Oh man, I've
Speaker 1: been waiting for you to ask me that for a
Speaker 1: long time. Alright, So I've got the old side get
Speaker 1: going with Movie Crush, my podcast where every Friday I
Speaker 1: sit down with someone awesome and talk about their favorite
Speaker 1: movie and kill it. Thank you. But I have now
Speaker 1: added a second weekly episode that publishes on Monday called
Speaker 1: Mini Crushes, And that's where I just sit in here
Speaker 1: with producer Noel. He's sort of the omniscient voice of God, uh,
Speaker 1: and he sort of chimes in, and I source a
Speaker 1: lot of questions from Facebook to the Movie Crush Facebook page,
Speaker 1: um listener mails, I do recommendations. It's just a really
Speaker 1: interactive fan based experience. So I want to plug the
Speaker 1: Mini Crushes and let everyone know that. Yesterday I dropped
Speaker 1: a very special mini Crush, which was The Chuck and
Speaker 1: it's Emily's podcast debut. Oh congratulations, man, that's right. It's
Speaker 1: called The Chuck and Emily drink wine uh and talk
Speaker 1: about the Oscar nominations. Oh yes, yeah, So we recorded
Speaker 1: this thing at home. We put the kid to bed
Speaker 1: and broke out some nice wine and did our pre
Speaker 1: Oscar round up, So that dropped yesterday, and then next Monday,
Speaker 1: the day after the Oscars, we're going to have our
Speaker 1: post Oscar round up where we talked about who won
Speaker 1: and what the speeches were like and who wore it best.
Speaker 1: That's awesome, man, Emily is going to be a star. Chuck. Yeah,
Speaker 1: she was actually pretty great. And if you want a
Speaker 1: little peek behind the merrital curtain, uh, this is this
Speaker 1: is your chance. So yeah, if you could check out
Speaker 1: movie Crush on Apple podcasts or where we get your podcasts.
Speaker 1: Nice man, do you feel indulged? Very much? Good? All right,
Speaker 1: let's talk about knife throwing. So I'm a little psyched
Speaker 1: about this because knife throwing taps into my ninja training
Speaker 1: that I did under Tommy Roper as I'm sure I've
Speaker 1: mentioned before, uh reading about this researching it. I never
Speaker 1: threw knives. We never made it that far, and maybe
Speaker 1: now I'll be I'll be hang gliding throwing knives at
Speaker 1: the same time. I'm going to get into both at once.
Speaker 1: But I did a little throwing star stuff. Throwing star
Speaker 1: is like the dummies, Uh, knife throwing because that thing
Speaker 1: always sticks, right, Yeah, I mean, depending on how many
Speaker 1: spikes you got coming off of it, and how many
Speaker 1: beers you've had, um, and and whether the tree is
Speaker 1: actually like a metal pole or not, you're probably gonna
Speaker 1: stick a throwing star. Throwing a knife is an entirely
Speaker 1: different endeavor, and it's something that anybody can do. That
Speaker 1: Nicholas Jerbis or Gervous never met him yet. Um, he
Speaker 1: points out, this is actually kind of like a low
Speaker 1: hanging hobby that you could. You can get a set
Speaker 1: of knives for ten fifteen bucks apiece. You probably one
Speaker 1: about five is well, we'll explain why, um, maybe six.
Speaker 1: You just practice, get yourself a good block of wood,
Speaker 1: and practice, and anybody can do this. It's not like
Speaker 1: you're born to throw knives. You practice and if you
Speaker 1: like it, you keep going and you just get better
Speaker 1: and better at it, and you can impress your friends
Speaker 1: and neighbors. Yes, and here's the point in the show
Speaker 1: where we issue our c o A. Kids, if you're
Speaker 1: out there, do not go get a steak knife from
Speaker 1: your drawer and start throwing it at your dog. That
Speaker 1: is not a throwing knife. And never throw anything at
Speaker 1: your dog. Kids, I will come find you. Yeah, never
Speaker 1: throw anything at anybody that's sharp. But um, throwing knives
Speaker 1: are built to throw. They're weighted and balanced to throw.
Speaker 1: They're not like regular old knives. And we'll get into
Speaker 1: all that. But just if you really want to try
Speaker 1: throwing knives, go ask mom and dad or Tommy Roper
Speaker 1: and get ready, get ready for a no, and then
Speaker 1: and then play them this podcast where it is an
Speaker 1: actual um circus art. And please, for the love of God,
Speaker 1: tell me this is the last one. I don't think
Speaker 1: of the circus arts. No, it's not. What else is?
Speaker 1: There's a bunch we've done the Globe of Death, flame
Speaker 1: swallowing lions, aiming swords, swallowing sword swallowing. H we did
Speaker 1: circus families, just straight up circus families. Human cannonball has
Speaker 1: got to be it. I don't think so, man. I
Speaker 1: think it's going to keep going into clouns clowns for sure. Yeah, um,
Speaker 1: they haven't. Don't want to p T Barnum though, No,
Speaker 1: you mean Hugh Jackman, what is it, Chuck Stradomas, I
Speaker 1: don't know something like that. I make one lucky casting
Speaker 1: call predict, one sexual predator and one bad Lifetime movie
Speaker 1: or what what was shark Nato sci fi sci fi movie?
Speaker 1: Three Little Things? That's all. That doesn't make me Nuxtra
Speaker 1: Domans haven't won the lottery yet. I think of all
Speaker 1: the things I have said that didn't come true right
Speaker 1: way more. Yeah, I guess that's true. You know, yeah,
Speaker 1: whatever writes in and well that didn't happen, right, you
Speaker 1: really got that. Actually, they do right in to tell
Speaker 1: us we got stuff wrong a lot. That's so we're
Speaker 1: gonna take this seriously because we want you ten year
Speaker 1: olds out there who want to get your parents to
Speaker 1: let you do this, to to see that you're taking
Speaker 1: this seriously by listening to this podcast. First. Okay, that's right.
Speaker 1: So what we're talking about specifically is known as uh
Speaker 1: somewhat ironically as an impalement act um, which is really
Speaker 1: weird thing to call it. It's well, it's um, yeah,
Speaker 1: it really is. I think it's a little tongue in cheek,
Speaker 1: you think, because the point is to not right, The
Speaker 1: point is to not impale somebody with this kind of thing, right,
Speaker 1: that's right. And and impalement acts are an umbrella term
Speaker 1: that cover not just knife throwing but bull whip cracking, oh, shoot,
Speaker 1: sharp shooting, archery, William tell kind of thing. All of
Speaker 1: those fall under the the umbrella term of impalement acts.
Speaker 1: Jerry's undressing over there to our left, she got very
Speaker 1: hot in the fire drop. Um. All right, so this
Speaker 1: goes back if we can get back on the way
Speaker 1: back machine, Um, all the way back to the late
Speaker 1: nineteenth century. We to go back here further than that.
Speaker 1: Are you gonna go like to ancient times? No? No,
Speaker 1: We'll still will just go to the nineteenth century because
Speaker 1: I'm sure Chinese people in ancient times through stuff that's
Speaker 1: stuck in walls. Well, I looked at I looked up
Speaker 1: the oldest knife and started everything. Apparently they did. Apparently
Speaker 1: they found the oldest knife five thousand years ago. Oh,
Speaker 1: the oldest knife knife. So we've been using knives longer
Speaker 1: than there have been modern humans, yeah, for sure. And
Speaker 1: then we at some point, probably about four hundred and
Speaker 1: ninety nine thousand years ago, we started throwing knives because
Speaker 1: it's stabbing is okay, but throwing a knife is when
Speaker 1: you really can come to appreciate what a knife does, okay,
Speaker 1: And there was nothing better in it, like an eighties movie.
Speaker 1: Then when like James Bond through a knife and I
Speaker 1: got a guy or American ninja. That's what I was
Speaker 1: trained on. Um. All right, so wild uh wild West shows,
Speaker 1: Buffalo Bill and his Wild West Shows travel throughout the
Speaker 1: United States, throughout Europe. Um knife throwing became a big
Speaker 1: spectacle at things like this, as well as obviously sharp
Speaker 1: shooting and ye probably archery. They probably did all the
Speaker 1: impalement arts. They definitely did um and they really brought
Speaker 1: it to the world, um to the to the point
Speaker 1: where you can just basically say that's where it started,
Speaker 1: was Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. Yeah. And this is
Speaker 1: one of those things where, through a modern lens, it
Speaker 1: it is incredibly misogynistic to think about the fact that
Speaker 1: you say, hey, let me take a scantily clad woman,
Speaker 1: a target girl, yeah that's what they call him, a
Speaker 1: target girl, and throw knives at her. Yeah, just stand there,
Speaker 1: throw knives near her. It's always a lady. She's always
Speaker 1: got on like a bikini or something. She's just like
Speaker 1: almost like wild West steampunk renaissance fair thing, right, you know,
Speaker 1: just to cover all of the all of the geek
Speaker 1: boys dreams and desires. Right, But when you look at
Speaker 1: it to the modern lens, it's like, man, that that
Speaker 1: is totally misogynistic to Uh, that is the act. Um,
Speaker 1: it's got a burlesque thing going on. Yeah sure, I
Speaker 1: mean you can see what they're trying to do is
Speaker 1: is toillate to the young boys in the audience. They're
Speaker 1: trying to sell tickets, and it probably wouldn't have sold
Speaker 1: as many tickets if they just had build a farmhand
Speaker 1: with a balloon in his mouth getting popped, you know.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's still pretty cool. You're still seeing the
Speaker 1: same thing. But yeah, it's just basically tradition and customed
Speaker 1: to have a scantily clad woman as your target girl. Again,
Speaker 1: that's what they call him, is the target girl, and
Speaker 1: that is the one of the two people involved in
Speaker 1: this impalement act. That's right. Um, we mentioned the balloon
Speaker 1: in the mouth. That was one of the big tricks.
Speaker 1: There was a German husband and wife named the Gibsons
Speaker 1: who introduced the very famous wheel of death in at
Speaker 1: the Ringling Brothers show at in Madison Square Garden. Have
Speaker 1: you seen this? Oh yeah, okay, So I had seen
Speaker 1: stuff like with knife throwing before, and I thought Flee
Speaker 1: Circus was another one. Do you remember our Flee Circus
Speaker 1: episode where it turns out that Flee Circus has actually
Speaker 1: involved real fleas. That was the best of the circus arts,
Speaker 1: and everybody thought it was like, no, it's magnets or
Speaker 1: just your imagination power of suggestion, and that's just not
Speaker 1: the case. The same thing applies to knife throwing impalement acts.
Speaker 1: Like I always thought, did you really? Yeah? I thought
Speaker 1: I think there was like a Happy Days or something
Speaker 1: like that where somebody gets volunteered. There's definitely an I
Speaker 1: Love Lucy with a knife act where she's the target girl.
Speaker 1: But there's some show where maybe Laverne and surely not
Speaker 1: I think about it. Anyway, the guys throwing them and
Speaker 1: like the knives are coming out of the backboard around them,
Speaker 1: So it's all an illusion, right, That is not true.
Speaker 1: In knife acts, you're if you're the target girl, a
Speaker 1: dude is throwing twelve inch long, extremely sharp, pointy knives
Speaker 1: right at your head and it's trying to get his
Speaker 1: close as possible to you without hitting you. And again
Speaker 1: it's not just that's just the profile where they're throwing
Speaker 1: knives around you and making like a chalk outline of
Speaker 1: your of your body. That's the profile. But there's other ones,
Speaker 1: like holding a cigarette in your mouth and knocking the
Speaker 1: ash off with a knife, or you're holding a flower
Speaker 1: in your mouth and they slowly like cut the stem
Speaker 1: off piece by piece. There's some some pretty interesting things
Speaker 1: that people have done with knife acts. Yeah, sometimes, and
Speaker 1: this is the riskiest of all moves. Riskier even more
Speaker 1: so than the Wheel of death is when they do
Speaker 1: the and they covered the target over with paper. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the veiled wheel of death, so you can't even see
Speaker 1: that spinning who is behind there? You just have to
Speaker 1: have it timed completely perfectly right. But if you take
Speaker 1: a step back and think about this, there is nothing
Speaker 1: about that act that should allow you to say, oh,
Speaker 1: if I throw like this, I will I will miss
Speaker 1: the person because they're spinning, so you have to know
Speaker 1: where their body is at every second. But you've taken
Speaker 1: away how you know that, which is your vision because
Speaker 1: they're behind a big sheet of paper that you're throwing
Speaker 1: knives through. And there's this guy who will talk about
Speaker 1: it a little further. His name is the Great throw Denie.
Speaker 1: I love this guy. Uh he he has done something.
Speaker 1: It's probably the most dangerous, most impressive knife throwing act
Speaker 1: anyone's ever done. He did the veiled wheel of death
Speaker 1: with two target girls on it. So he has two
Speaker 1: girls strapped to a board, spinning behind a big piece
Speaker 1: of paper that he can't see them through, and he's
Speaker 1: throwing knives at them. Yes, very fast. The guy threw
Speaker 1: him on an average of a knife every point five
Speaker 1: nine seconds, UM, and he didn't hit either one of them. Amazing.
Speaker 1: It is amazing. It's so amazing. I think we should
Speaker 1: take a break and re regroup. We're back. We just
Speaker 1: watched uh one hour of grade thirteen even videos. Uh.
Speaker 1: He apparently caught on like in its fifties. Yeah. I
Speaker 1: was like, hey, I'm pretty good at this. Back in
Speaker 1: just I guess somebody was like, maybe have you tried
Speaker 1: throwing knives? And he said no, I haven't, And they
Speaker 1: were like, well, tried throwing knives and he said, well, fine,
Speaker 1: I will. A couple of weeks later, he tried throwing
Speaker 1: knives and he said I really like this. Um. He
Speaker 1: said it felt natural and right. So he started throwing
Speaker 1: knives and entered competitions and UM started winning. I think
Speaker 1: he became world champion. With him like two years he
Speaker 1: beat the other four people. Uh, and then he said,
Speaker 1: you know what, this is fun and all like these competitions,
Speaker 1: but I think I want to try and act like
Speaker 1: an old throwback impalement act. So we started one when
Speaker 1: by tuxedo and basically bought his wife Barbara target girl.
Speaker 1: Get up that his uh target girl one of them. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think she may have been the original one. Uh.
Speaker 1: Taught her to smoke cigarettes so he could knock the
Speaker 1: ash off of the end of him. And there you go.
Speaker 1: Impalement act achieved. But not only that, Chuck like the
Speaker 1: guy is like legitimately the best knife thrower on the planet. Well,
Speaker 1: he's one of them. He holds a record for fastest.
Speaker 1: But boy, you go down a YouTube rabbit hole and
Speaker 1: to like people like Ralph Thorne and better than Great Thordini. Huh,
Speaker 1: well Great Thordini does the impalement act as in the
Speaker 1: Circus art. Ralph Thorn is like, if you're running through
Speaker 1: the woods chasing somebody, I haven't seen this guy and
Speaker 1: this is well that's the Thorn style. We'll get into
Speaker 1: those styles later, okay, but um yeah, he will like
Speaker 1: bunch himself off of a tree stump in the air
Speaker 1: and throwing behind his back. And see now that's basically
Speaker 1: the training I was. Yeah, yeah, like martial arts, real world,
Speaker 1: suburban neighborhood dangers. There's a raccoon. Oh no, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: you're not throwing a raccoons. Um, alright, so the raccoon
Speaker 1: comes at me. Well sure, okay, Um, here's what you
Speaker 1: need if you if you're gonna throw a knife, you
Speaker 1: need a throwing knife. Throwing knife. Like I said, it's
Speaker 1: not a steak knife. It is very much made to
Speaker 1: be thrown. It is balanced so that you throw it.
Speaker 1: And we'll talk about the different ways that they're balanced.
Speaker 1: But one thing they're not is sharp on the sides.
Speaker 1: Yeah they're very pointy, but um they're dull on the
Speaker 1: edges because you're gonna a lot of times to be
Speaker 1: throwing it by that blade. Um, so get a knife
Speaker 1: for throwing. The old saying, Um, sharp of point, sharper
Speaker 1: point is the point, sharp of edge? It doesn't It
Speaker 1: does you no good? That old Yeah, that's a great thing.
Speaker 1: Like that should go on a T shirt. You should so. Um, yeah,
Speaker 1: you want a sharp point. But there's there's nothing about
Speaker 1: a sharp edge that's going to help you in any way,
Speaker 1: shape or form, because the whole point again is the
Speaker 1: point that's gonna stick into that end of whatever that
Speaker 1: target is, which is usually a block of wood. Right. So, um,
Speaker 1: depending on where how you're going to throw it, you
Speaker 1: want to throw the heavy end first. And there's a
Speaker 1: reason for this. The reason is is that, if you
Speaker 1: want to get technical about it, velocity equals um distance
Speaker 1: divided by time, right. And when you're throwing a knife,
Speaker 1: especially the heavy end first, the heavy end has traveled
Speaker 1: a further distance in the same amount of time than
Speaker 1: the lighter end. This friends creates something very parting a
Speaker 1: knife throwing, although not fundamental, which is spin. Okay, And
Speaker 1: so if you throw the throw the knife, you're gonna
Speaker 1: throw it either blade end or handle end. And the
Speaker 1: end regards what you're holding when you throw it. And
Speaker 1: if you're holding say a knife handle, and you're throwing
Speaker 1: it from the handle end, you're the front of the knife.
Speaker 1: The point is going to be weighted. It's going to
Speaker 1: be heavier so that that starts the spin. If you're
Speaker 1: throwing it blade first, the handle itself will be heavier
Speaker 1: so that will start the spin. And there's a couple
Speaker 1: of different depending on which way you're throwing. There's a
Speaker 1: the spin is going to take place over this the
Speaker 1: course of um a very short distance actually, and so
Speaker 1: let me let me just back up a second here.
Speaker 1: There's there's some factors involved. Okay. They are distanced to target,
Speaker 1: length of NiFe, weight and balance and then knife type. Right,
Speaker 1: So the distance the target is going to is going
Speaker 1: to tell you what type of throw you want. That's right. Um,
Speaker 1: the kind of knife. Uh, they say, for every good
Speaker 1: rule of thumb here, just throw it out. But they
Speaker 1: do mention a rule of thumb regardless. That says a
Speaker 1: blade that weighs about one ounce per inch, so in
Speaker 1: this per inch of your the whole knife. Yeah, so um,
Speaker 1: they shouldn't. Well, you can throw it ever you want,
Speaker 1: but ten to sixteen ounces is a good starter knife, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, and about that long or maybe twelve to
Speaker 1: four fourteen inches and about that many ounces is where
Speaker 1: you want to start off as a beginner. And all
Speaker 1: kinds of shapes too, Like some of them are like
Speaker 1: little spears. Uh, some have multiple points more like throwing stars. Uh.
Speaker 1: They really run the gamut right and the um. So
Speaker 1: depending on how you're gonna throw, whether it's a handle
Speaker 1: throw or a blade throw. The weight of the knife
Speaker 1: is going to be either in the handle or the blade.
Speaker 1: It's going to be the opposite of where you're holding
Speaker 1: the knife. Um. And if you throw holding the blade,
Speaker 1: you're going to throw a half turn. It's a half
Speaker 1: turn throw right. And the reason they call it that
Speaker 1: is because the knife only makes one half turn. The
Speaker 1: blade straightens out from your hand toward the target, and
Speaker 1: then that's the only turn it makes. Yeah, it's not
Speaker 1: like in the movies a lot of times you'll see
Speaker 1: you go right and turn like nine times and stick
Speaker 1: the guy in the forehead. That's really not what you're
Speaker 1: doing with knife throwing. No, it's basically if you if
Speaker 1: you're throwing it by the blade, it's gonna make one
Speaker 1: half turn and that's it. So you if your blade throwing,
Speaker 1: you would stand closest to the target, right, So if
Speaker 1: some guys coming at you dressed as a raccoon and
Speaker 1: you know he's gonna hurt you and you can throw
Speaker 1: a knife and he's real close, you would throw by
Speaker 1: the blade. That's right. Uh. And in fact, I don't
Speaker 1: even know if it's possible bowl to throw a knife
Speaker 1: like they do in the movies that I don't think
Speaker 1: so just tumbles because every video I saw there, like
Speaker 1: you try and prevent tumbling as much as you can,
Speaker 1: Like that's the whole game. It's too because physics says
Speaker 1: that a revolving object that suddenly breaks free will continue
Speaker 1: to move in a straight line tangential to the point
Speaker 1: at which it's released. In other words, that release points
Speaker 1: a little tricky. You know, you gotta dial that in.
Speaker 1: But we'll get to that too. And on the actual
Speaker 1: throwing right, um, so the uh. The next the next
Speaker 1: furthest away from the target is if you're holding the
Speaker 1: the knife by the handle and you're throwing it, it's
Speaker 1: going to make that's a full turn, full spin uh,
Speaker 1: to where the blade goes from facing the target, facing
Speaker 1: away from the target, and back to facing the target
Speaker 1: in time to stick into that target and not embarrassing
Speaker 1: he bounce off because it hit the blade or the
Speaker 1: handle first. But it's very humiliating, so humility. Uh. And
Speaker 1: then the last one is the furthest thrown away And
Speaker 1: it's about the most you would ever want a blade
Speaker 1: to turn, which is two times. That's about thirty ft
Speaker 1: or about ten meters away from your target. You could
Speaker 1: possibly get it to spin twice, but usually you just
Speaker 1: wanted to spin once or half and that's it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And uh, did you say a half turns about seven
Speaker 1: or eight feet. I don't think I did. I just
Speaker 1: said it was the closest. Yeah, about seven or eight feet.
Speaker 1: It depends full spin about twelve to fifteen And like
Speaker 1: you said, the the great throw Dni double Bondini double
Speaker 1: twist is up to Yeah. Although one of these other
Speaker 1: throws that we're gonna get into, this thorn throw. One
Speaker 1: of the benefits is you can throw from anywhere, supposedly.
Speaker 1: So we're gonna take one more break and then we're
Speaker 1: gonna come back and teach you a little bit about
Speaker 1: throwing and then, uh, what to look for in a
Speaker 1: good knife. Okay, so you've got you know about how
Speaker 1: close you want to stay into the target, depending on
Speaker 1: whether you're holding the knife by the blade or the handle.
Speaker 1: The good thing is is there are a couple of
Speaker 1: different grips, but they're very similar. So if you're like,
Speaker 1: I want to get into blade throwing first because that
Speaker 1: looks pretty cool, you're going to basically pinch the blade
Speaker 1: of the knife and remember these are not sharp edges,
Speaker 1: so you should be fine if you do. If you
Speaker 1: I saw, if you are using a sharp edge knife,
Speaker 1: you want to hold the blunt end. But you don't
Speaker 1: want to do that. You don't even want to do that,
Speaker 1: so so it doesn't really matter which way you're holding it.
Speaker 1: But if you if it is sharp on what edge,
Speaker 1: hold the other edge and you're just basically pinching it
Speaker 1: between your your thumb and your first three fingers just
Speaker 1: a little pitch. Yeah, it's just just a teeny pinch.
Speaker 1: Maybe stick your pinky out for effecture, all right, and
Speaker 1: that that's the blade throw. Yeah, and you've already got
Speaker 1: your target. By the way, at this point, I know
Speaker 1: you mentioned a block of wood, but they recommend um
Speaker 1: aims small. What does it start? Small? Aim small? Yeah,
Speaker 1: which is don't don't You don't need a tree trunk
Speaker 1: um sliced up and put on a wall like you
Speaker 1: just need, like whatever, a little twelve inch by twelve
Speaker 1: inch block of wood. Or maybe if you want to
Speaker 1: screw a bunch of wood together and then draw a
Speaker 1: target on there, that's fine too. Yeah, you should probably
Speaker 1: glue though, because the screws might your your knife might
Speaker 1: bounce off of them. Yeah, you know if you're using
Speaker 1: metal screws, okay, as opposed to the traditional wooden dell right,
Speaker 1: so umptail joint right, So the the that's the what
Speaker 1: did I say, that's the blade throw? Right, yeah, you
Speaker 1: did blade throw. There's a handle throw too, and this
Speaker 1: one is called a hatchet throw or hammer throw or
Speaker 1: the handle throw you could call it to and everybody
Speaker 1: all know what you're talking about. Yeah, and you stand, uh,
Speaker 1: you're a little further back for this one because you've
Speaker 1: got your your full turn going uh, and then you
Speaker 1: just grip it like a baseball beat and swing away
Speaker 1: right right, close your eyes, and you hope for the best,
Speaker 1: say ninja strike, right yeah yeah. So um. The cool
Speaker 1: thing is what you were saying about starting small, aiming small,
Speaker 1: is that when you when you figure out that there's
Speaker 1: actually just a few mechanics going on here, you'll be
Speaker 1: able to tell what part of your throw is actually off,
Speaker 1: whether it's distance, whether it's when you're releasing, whether it's
Speaker 1: um how you're gripping it. The problems are, the issues
Speaker 1: with your throw will show up, and you'll be able
Speaker 1: to read based on how the knife is landing or sticking?
Speaker 1: What's wrong with your throw? Yeah? Like if you are
Speaker 1: throwing I think blade first and it sticks, but it's
Speaker 1: sticking at a really hard angle where the where the
Speaker 1: handle is pointing down. Then they say, maybe just move
Speaker 1: back six inches with your stance, is it? Yeah, you're right,
Speaker 1: You're right, and then try it again. Yeah, because that
Speaker 1: means that you're the knife didn't get its full rotation right.
Speaker 1: You wanted to basically be sticking straight out perpendicular to
Speaker 1: the target. Yeah, that's a correct throw or as you're
Speaker 1: as you're learning to do this. Yeah. And did you
Speaker 1: say that it's generally your opposite leg of your throwing
Speaker 1: hand forward? Oh yeah, so so yeah, so the stance, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean generally. But then again I also saw this
Speaker 1: Russian guy that through with his throwing leg or the
Speaker 1: same leg as a throwing hand forward, and he was like,
Speaker 1: you know it all works basically. Was this thing good?
Speaker 1: I knew you had the Italian thing going on, but
Speaker 1: Russian was good. Oh yeah, I can I can do that.
Speaker 1: So let's get into of the throw them. Okay, so
Speaker 1: the stance, I should say, So with the with the stance,
Speaker 1: you're standing with your Um, you're you're throwing arm. The
Speaker 1: leg opposite you're throwing arm is closest to the target,
Speaker 1: kind of like you're throwing a dart, you know. Um, yes, okay,
Speaker 1: like that. Well, actually that's not quite true when I
Speaker 1: throw it. When you throw a dart, your you're the
Speaker 1: leg that is, the foot that is on the line,
Speaker 1: is the same side as your throwing hand, is it. Yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: well this is the opposite of that. Maybe I've been
Speaker 1: throwing darts wrong all this time. So the so the
Speaker 1: the leg opposite you're throwing arm is the one you
Speaker 1: want closest to the target traditionally, right, Traditionally your weight
Speaker 1: is on your back leg, though, is you're throwing, and
Speaker 1: what you're doing is you're gripping the knife however you
Speaker 1: want to blade or handle either way. You line it
Speaker 1: up right with your eye against the target, bring your
Speaker 1: arm back behind your head, and then keeping your wrists straight.
Speaker 1: You don't want to flip your wrist or anything like it.
Speaker 1: You bring it in an arc in front of you,
Speaker 1: and you finish like you are shaking somebody's hand. If
Speaker 1: you're going, hey, how are you right? But I got
Speaker 1: a knife? Right? The thing is here's the thing. You're
Speaker 1: gonna want to release at that handshake part when your
Speaker 1: hand is straight out in front of you, and you're
Speaker 1: gonna find nothing but heartache trying to throw a knife
Speaker 1: like that. Oh, if you release it right at the end.
Speaker 1: Oh no, it goes it'll go straight down, right, it'll
Speaker 1: go down in front of you. Because when you release
Speaker 1: an object that's going in an arc, it wants to
Speaker 1: go straight in a tangential line from the the the
Speaker 1: top of the arc. Right, that's right. So you want
Speaker 1: to release it at the top of the arc. So
Speaker 1: that is I was practicing just in the air, trying
Speaker 1: to to make my brain release it at the top,
Speaker 1: and that is really difficult to do because you think
Speaker 1: initially that the nicest gonna go shooting up into the air.
Speaker 1: It's not. It's gonna go straight. That's right. Pretty neat stuff,
Speaker 1: that's right. And this is just I don't even know
Speaker 1: what the traditional throw was called to you, I know,
Speaker 1: I didn't see a name for it. Well, there are
Speaker 1: some other throws which I might as well go ahead
Speaker 1: and mention I've teased. One is the aforementioned thorn style
Speaker 1: from Ralph Thorne. Okay, that's named after a dude is
Speaker 1: named after a dude. Either way, it sounds cool. Yeah
Speaker 1: this one, Um, did you see this one at all? Inline?
Speaker 1: I didn't see that one. I kind of had an
Speaker 1: idea of what they were talking about based on the article. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they say that it resembles spear throwing. The action, Um,
Speaker 1: I guess, and that you're you're not taking the knife
Speaker 1: like behind your ear. You're sort of just extending your
Speaker 1: whole arm and doing a big almost like you're throwing
Speaker 1: a baseball pitch. Sure, that's what I imagine. Yeah, that's what.
Speaker 1: It sort of looked like, a side arm, sort of
Speaker 1: like a bunch of people were doing it different. And
Speaker 1: then this guy's jumping all over behind his back like
Speaker 1: Thorne style seems to be two just do whatever you want. Okay,
Speaker 1: that's not true. Thorne's probably just like so angry right now.
Speaker 1: He's like, yeah, come out. Uh. Then there was the
Speaker 1: Russian style and this look it's a very compact um,
Speaker 1: the elbow is in near the body, you hold the
Speaker 1: knife behind the ear. Uh. And this I saw it
Speaker 1: was a little bit more like, you know, like that
Speaker 1: kind of thing. So that seems to me like depending
Speaker 1: on how close you're holding your elbow to your body
Speaker 1: like you're gonna chop the top of your ear off.
Speaker 1: Well you want to avoid that, but it's it's more
Speaker 1: like you're pushing it out rather than throwing it like
Speaker 1: a tomahawk. So that's what I thought, Um Moon you
Speaker 1: on style was like where you're basically like shoving the
Speaker 1: knife forward. Well what I saw with that style, And again,
Speaker 1: all these videos were different, so I don't know if
Speaker 1: these people are just I mean, it is YouTube making it.
Speaker 1: It's not like they're like, I'm an accredited thornist. But
Speaker 1: the MoMu In style looks like they were having the
Speaker 1: knife like in their hand, like kind of in their
Speaker 1: palm and would throw it. But I don't know if
Speaker 1: that was because of the knife, because the guy on
Speaker 1: there was like, this is a bo bo shurrikan spike
Speaker 1: which is thrown in the Momuen style. And that's what
Speaker 1: this article said to people really get into this online
Speaker 1: online though, right, That's what I did discover. So the
Speaker 1: three the three things, those three types thorn style, Momuan
Speaker 1: and Russian style, those are all styles of knife throwing
Speaker 1: that involved no spin. That's what the common thread that
Speaker 1: they all have yeah, which is pretty cool. It is cool,
Speaker 1: And there's a couple of reasons you want to do this.
Speaker 1: The most knife throwers say that's really tough on the
Speaker 1: joints after a while. Yeah, that's what they say. And um,
Speaker 1: the reason why is because it involves like doing crazy
Speaker 1: like snapping motions with your elbow and your wrist and stuff.
Speaker 1: Whereas with knife throwing, it's just a smooth arc you're
Speaker 1: making it. Almost all of the motion is in your
Speaker 1: shoulder and your elbow, Your wrist stays straight, and you
Speaker 1: just areally generally releasing your grasp on the NiFe. Right,
Speaker 1: do this into his ages all day long? Right? Yeah?
Speaker 1: That with the no spin styles, it is, it's just tougher.
Speaker 1: It's more of a snapping motion. That's like you're gonna
Speaker 1: get tennis elbow after a while. The reason the advantage
Speaker 1: that these have is like, if you're trying to throw
Speaker 1: a knife through a hole, you can't have a twelve
Speaker 1: inch knife spinning making this twenty four inch arc basically
Speaker 1: or or circle. Um, you just want to send it
Speaker 1: straight like a missile through that hole into some dude's leg,
Speaker 1: into his calf, and then you you pounce on him.
Speaker 1: Put your hand over his mouth and nose until he
Speaker 1: falls asleep, and then you can advance further towards the castle. Well,
Speaker 1: the Russian I saw was talking about the first thing
Speaker 1: you do is find the balance point. So he held
Speaker 1: out his finger and put the knife on it until,
Speaker 1: you know, like a little until I found the exact point.
Speaker 1: And he's like, there's a balance point. So once you
Speaker 1: find out where that is, that will teach you exactly
Speaker 1: how to hold it, um in any in any scenario. Basically,
Speaker 1: I know where the balance point is though, So whatever
Speaker 1: you're doing, though, if if this sounds like something you
Speaker 1: want to do, whether it's spin throwing or no spin
Speaker 1: throwing techniques, the key to knife throwing of any kind
Speaker 1: is practice, practice, practice, And this article actually gives a
Speaker 1: really good piece of advice. It says, get a little
Speaker 1: set of throwing knives, the best you can afford, because
Speaker 1: the more expensive they are, typically with them, the better
Speaker 1: the more well made they are. And um, get some,
Speaker 1: get like I said, of three or five or whatever,
Speaker 1: because you're you're going to have to practice rep eatedly.
Speaker 1: And if you have one knife and you're standing fifteen
Speaker 1: feet away you throw it, you have to go get it.
Speaker 1: You throw it again, go get it. That's not nearly
Speaker 1: as fun as trying to throw like five quickly in
Speaker 1: a row. So you're number one, you're going to be
Speaker 1: more entertained. Um. But also if you do, no matter
Speaker 1: how many knives you have, if you start to lose focus,
Speaker 1: if you start to get bored or frustrated, stop because
Speaker 1: if there's one thing about knife throwing, it's meant to
Speaker 1: be fun. And if you're practicing with your friends, uh,
Speaker 1: don't they don't stand to the side of the target.
Speaker 1: They don't stand directly behind you. Um, I would recommend
Speaker 1: they stand well behind you and well to one side
Speaker 1: of you. I've got one even better. Don't even don't
Speaker 1: even let your friends anywhere near you. You you have
Speaker 1: to be alone while you're practicing throwing knives, but you
Speaker 1: have to be in text or phone contact with your
Speaker 1: parents who are watching you from a safe distance, streaming
Speaker 1: it to your parents. Maybe. So, Uh, you should go
Speaker 1: and look at some of these Ralph Thorn videos because
Speaker 1: the funniest, the funniest part is uh the almost um
Speaker 1: not angry, but just his trudge towards the target afterward
Speaker 1: is very like I don't know, it's weird. He'll jump
Speaker 1: up in the air and throw a few and then
Speaker 1: he's just like do do do and then walks over
Speaker 1: and undoes it from the log like, I don't know.
Speaker 1: All the pizzazz leaves as soon as he's thrown. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's when you need. The pizzazz is during the throwing.
Speaker 1: The rest is just wasted energy. Yeah, but you don't
Speaker 1: see throw Denie. That's the difference between an impalement act
Speaker 1: in a dude in his backyard on YouTube. Well, throw
Speaker 1: Denie has the smarts to hire an editor to edit
Speaker 1: that part out. Yeah, you know, it's a good point.
Speaker 1: I don't know if we said the great throw Denie's name.
Speaker 1: His name is David ed Amovitch and he's a neat guy.
Speaker 1: Great name. So if you want to know more about
Speaker 1: the great throw Denie or what's what's Thorne's first name,
Speaker 1: Jesse Thorn and the other thing Ralph Thorne, Ralph Thorn,
Speaker 1: or any kind of nice throw and go go check
Speaker 1: out some videos. Again, do not do this unless your
Speaker 1: parents say it's okay, and do it safely. Don't be stupid,
Speaker 1: and never ever throw any living thing ever of any
Speaker 1: kind ever or Josh and Chu are going to be
Speaker 1: so mad at you. Ah. And in the meantime, let's
Speaker 1: listen to some listener. Man. All right, I'm gonna call this, oh,
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Speaker 1: I know, man, I've moved countries, so most of my
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Speaker 1: Very nice. Wow, this is crazy. This is from Hazel.
Speaker 1: She has to We have a po box as you
Speaker 1: can send some Jaffa cakes. Oh, this is nice. I
Speaker 1: don't remember if I gave Hazel or address. Well please do.
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Speaker 1: address and we can get some choppy cakes. Thanks for
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Speaker 1: kept the home fires burning for you there, Hazel. I'd
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