[Gentry] Growing up, I was always just doing

as many different things as possible.

I always loved learning something new and trying new things,

so yo-yoing was just kind of one of those things.

[Host] And it's an easy hobby to pick up.

It's something you can do all the time,

whether you're waiting in line at the movie theater

or waiting for a table at, going out to dinner,

and you can carry it around in your pocket.

It's just something I just stuck with.

[Host] Did he ever.

My name's Gentry Stein, and I'm a world yo-yo champion.

Check it out.

So yo-yos are my job,

so I basically compete in yo-yo contests,

travel all around the world to teach people how to yo-yo,

and basically just share my passion for yo-yo.

[Host] Stein has more passion than most do for this toy.

[Reporter] It's love at first sight when school kids

get a glimpse of the latest in yo-yos and yo-yo techniques.

[Host] Yo-yo is hardly a new amusement.

The ancient toy was once made of clay

and dates back centuries.

Again, that's kind of the stigma that yo-yos have

because it kinda started as just a simple toy

and really it is a simple toy,

but as the design of yo-yos has changed,

it's become a lot easier to learn how to do tricks with them

and you can do a lot crazier tricks.

But gone are the days of just shooting the moon

and walking the dog.

Modern yo-yos roll on sealed ball bearing axes

and slippery synthetic strings,

which have opened up entirely new tricks and routines.

Really, since there's such little friction,

the yo-yos gonna spin for anywhere from two to 10 minutes.

So if I'm doing tricks, I could do a whole trick

that's like a minute long and the yo-yos just

on one throw.

Stein is one of the best at making the most of a throw.

He's captured audiences with his mastery

of sophisticated tricks,

his flashy style and elaborate routines set to music,

like this one he created for us.

A lot of yo-yo players are really into the technical side.

There's a lot of aspects that you can really dive into

but something that I try to do is

have a really well-balanced routine

and something that is cool for an audience to watch,

is cool for people who maybe don't yo-yo

or don't really know what modern yo-yoing is.

If you have long enough spin,

you can do tricks that are really big

and landing on the string really hard.

And so, let's say you're trying to choreograph to music

and land on a really hard beat,

you can do a trick where the yo-yo shoots

way up in the air and lands really hard

and the yo-yo's still gonna be spinning

and you can continue a trick that way,

whereas with some of the older yo-yos,

you would be trying a trick

and maybe 10 seconds in, your yo-yo's already

almost out of spin, so it really kinda limited

what you could do with the yo-yo.

But now that they spin so much longer

and the shape is a lot wider,

you can really just do so much more with it.

I'm sorry.

[Host] Behind the seemingly effortless routines

are thousands of hours of practice.

This year, I practiced about six to eight hours a day

for almost the entire year for the world contest,

but a lot of that practice involves

building the whole performance.

So it takes time to create the trick.

Once you've created your tricks,

you can start building your routine.

Once you've built the routine,

then it just comes down to practicing the routine

as many times as possible.

Man, my finger's starting to really hurt from the string.

[Host] All those hours can take a toll.

So I built up a callous on my finger

where the yoyo is here because it's constantly pulling on it

and then as you're practicing a lot,

you kinda get like a rope burn on your hand,

so sometimes I'll wear a glove to help protect my finger.

[Host] His dedication and showmanship

won him a world yo-yo championship

when he was just 18 years old.

Creating something and then performing that creation

for an audience

and feeling the energy that the audience gives to me

after they see that creation is like

that feeling just never got old.

And it's just something I fell in love with.

[Host] Since then, he's continued to refine his technique

and compete at the highest level.

The tricks that you see me do now probably look crazy,

but that's because it's been like

10 years of building up from more basic tricks

and a lot of the tricks I'm doing too

are very basic simple things that are happening,

but they're happening, a lot of them are happening

in a small amount of time.

[Host] And like all yo-yoers, he started with the basics.

So there's a foundation of tricks that you can learn

when you're first getting into it

and then once you reach that certain level,

then really that sets you up to

create all kinds of different tricks that

maybe no one has ever seen before.

So it really becomes like this performing art

where you're showcasing

these creative maneuvers and movements.

[Host] Stein showed us a few foundational moves

and how he builds on them

to create intricate, original tricks.

The first set of moves he broke down were mounts.

And all a mount really is is landing the yo-yo on a string

with the string around your fingers

in a different formation.

Those formations can be super basic,

like the trapeze, where the yo-yo

swings around the index finger,

or they can be a bit jazzier,

like the double or nothing mount,

where the yo-yo is wrapped around even more fingers,

or the wrist mount, where you guessed it,

the yo-yo hangs near the wrist.

Basically with all these mounts,

they're just building blocks to

a bunch of different tricks that you can do.

[Host] Just like mounts, hops can be building blocks

to more advanced tricks.

This is one of my favorite tricks called Eli hops.

It's a really flashy trick,

where the yo-yo hops off the string.

And there's a bunch of different ways that

you can hop the yo-yo off the string.

You can just do the regular way.

You can do it over your arm,

over your head.

And you can even do it horizontally.

[Host] The last type of move

that Stein broke down for us, slacks,

where the yo-yoer creates a bit of give in the string.

And to do that, you basically just

pinch the string somewhere

and loosen your hands a little bit,

so you create this slack here

that you can start to maneuver within all of your tricks.

[Host] Slacks are useful in a bunch of different tricks,

like this one that Stein created.

You can see throughout this trick,

I keep pinching the string to create a slack

and then I use that slack in a bunch of different ways

to make the trick super cool.

[Host] Watch that trick again.

There's a reason why he's a world champion.

Put slacks and hops and mounts together,

and you've created your very own original trick,

like this one.

I might do some hops to start,

put the yo-yo in a position where I can do a slack,

find myself in that double or nothing mount again,

and from here there's pretty much limitless possibilities

of the different things you can do.

Working horizontally opens up a whole new set

of possibilities.

These are super hard.

On a vertical trick, you're not actually going to be able

to utilize the horizontal plane very much

because the centrifugal force of the yo-yo

is forcing it to stay on this same plane.

So what you can do to actually open up

a lot of different possibilities is

make the yo-yo horizontal where it's spinning sideways

in front of you and then you can completely utilize

that horizontal plane and it's going to allow you

to do a lot more crazy tricks.

[Host] But with those crazy horizontal tricks

come new challenges.

As you're practicing vertical tricks,

at any time, you can stop

and kinda analyze what you're doing

and maybe figure out what kinda step you want to take next

if you're creating a trick.

But the reason why horizontal tricks are harder

is because you can't stop the yo-yo at any time

because it's just gonna fall off the string

and ruin the trick.

So with all horizontal tricks,

you always have to keep the yo-yo moving the whole time,

and if any time you want to stop the yo-yo,

you have to immediately change direction.

[Host] As if that weren't had enough,

Stein brings the yo-yo down by his knees,

making these horizontal tricks even more difficult.

The thing is with these tricks though is

your hands are actually pointed down instead of up.

So it kind of takes a whole different level of skill

to be able to do a horizontal trick downward like this.

[Host] And then, of course,

there's the performance side of things.

Something I really like to do

to take the tricks to the next level

is start incorporating body movement

and this to me makes the trick look a lot more interesting

and if you want to get extra flashy

you can even jump over the yo-yo.

I think what makes yo-yoing so appealing to anyone

is the fact that anyone can do it.

A lot of kids might be really good at math in school

or might be really good at sports,

but some kids don't really find that thing

that they are really good at

and that they can really thrive in.

And so, a lot of the times,

yo-yoing can be that thing for them

and it can bring a lot of really special experiences

into someone's life even though it's just a toy.