Thursday, June 19, 2025

April 10, 2019

Think You’ve Got Yo-Yo Skills? This World Champ Will Put You To Shame [Video]

I can clearly remember the first time I mastered the 'walking a dog' move, and then there was the 'around the world' trick. Gentry Stein is a little more skilled.

No, readers under 18, a yo-yo isn’t some kind of app.

I can clearly remember the first time I mastered the ‘walking a dog’ move, and then there was the ‘around the world’ trick.

String both together without ending up in a tangled ball of string, and you felt like the big dawg.

Well, that’s cool, but Gentry Stein has taken things a few steps further on his way to being crowned a yo-yo world champion. He’s also turned it into a career, as WIRED points out:

Stein is a world champion of the yo-yo—and he didn’t get that honor with musty old moves like round-the-world or walking the dog. His routines are a carefully choreographed flow of sophisticated tricks set to music…

To stay competitive he puts in hours of practice every day. Thankfully, yo-yo’s are portable and convenient.

“It’s something you can do all the time, whether you’re waiting in line at the movie theater or, like, waiting for a table at a restaurant. And you can carry it around in your pocket,” he says.

Today Stein travels the world competing, appearing on TV shows, and putting on demonstrations and lessons

There are definitely worse jobs out there.

Go on, Gentry (an apt name for a yo-yo world champ), put us part-timers to shame:

[source:wired]