When I think of tug of war, I think of this......
In the past few days though, I've discovered a whole new world of Tug of War through training with the Anstey Young Farmers newly established ladies T.O.W. team.
Because this was only their second practice session, I got to work on the basics right along with them!
1. When you pick up the rope, you want to be standing on the left side of it and pull it up to about hip level, with the outside hand in the front and right hand in the back.
2 "Taking the Strain" - this is when you drive the heal on your leading leg, the left , into the ground in front of you and allow the body to fall back to about a 45 degree angle with the ground, with the right foot slightly further back. The metal heal boots used for T.O.W. make this much more effective than regular boots.
3."Pull" - when the judge gives this command, it is game on. The right foot is kicked forward (referred to as the drop at practice), lowering the team body level as everyone gets stretched out but the hips are pulled up close to the rope (as modeled below by the Anstey lads).
4. As you pull, the left leg is used mainly as a prop as you dig and push with the right, pulling back the rope and you try not to lean on the rope too much, as this makes it more difficult for the person behind you.
As you can see from these photos, we had a good practice with lots of hard work, but still heaps of fun as we first pulled the box full of weights and a system of pullies and then moved on to squaring off in smaller teams.
THE TAKE AWAY - Getting knocked on your bum isn't always fun, but it's far better than watching from the side lines and never taking a go.
Check out the video of part of one of the drills we did for the full effect. We started this pull with 3 minutes of holding the box at the top before this clip. (Mind your ears towards the end)
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