 well guys i can't say i knew when it would happen but i always knew it would happen my return to the rugby tutorial youtube space and it begins here in christchurch at the shirley vikings local ground i live just around the corner i could have gone to my home ground littleton place that means a hell of a lot to me but you know what i just had this epiphany you know i had i had i had an epiphany and i've had a few of those recently certainly regarding my my rugby um content but i had an epiphany and that was if you don't do this now it may never happen my first youtube video i posted ever on this channel was posted just over 10 years ago and that means that this pretty much marks my 10 year anniversary on youtube youtube means a hell of a lot to me no wonder it's so hard for me to let go i've tried it many times it hasn't worked because it's been a big part of my life bigger as time has gone on but a big part of my life for 10 years and anything that's a big part of your life for 10 years it's not impossible to let go but it's bloody hard anyway i think that the first video i create is actually going to be to do with some differences between as far as the kicking action is concerned both from the ground and through the air after becoming a fan of american football and certainly of american football kickers giving them the props they deserve you know what i mean because they get absolutely none at all and unless one of them does something absolutely amazing which doesn't happen often but it does happen so they do get their their dues if it is well deserved but there are two main differences between well two main aspects that i have noticed american football kickers do in their action one from the kicker the place kicker and one from the punter two different positions two different actions and two things two two uh requirements two actions in the game of american football that i as a rugby player and a player who had really only kicked with a rugby ball and a rugby style whatever that may be it was really interesting to me to to notice one thing from each that i have now brought over into my action in rugby if the situation warrants it so as you can probably tell i'm trying to do this video in one take and i think it's going relatively well so let's try and keep going what i've got here is a failure to have brought my rugby balls in front of me just to see the difference first and this may seem obvious but i think through bridging the two sports on my channel uh i've certainly we meet personally whenever i come down to the rugby field or whenever i have an opportunity to to kick in the backyard or on the beach or whatever a an oval shaped ball it's only ever after having watched american football that i entertained the thought of kicking it spirally rather than end over end now i know i have actually got a video about 10 years ago in on my channel teaching how to do a spiral punt i can safely say that the only reason i made that video was to have an alternative to a drop pump i never used it it's too risky i think i mentioned that i would never in the field of play having to run at the same time have even thought about trying to set up a spiral punt and i think the main reason for that is because i had no idea how to drop it properly now when i went to pro kick australia for a trial first thing they said was what the hell are you doing and they brought my hand from like trying to i can't i honestly can't even remember what i was doing but it was certainly basically i was trying to drop it on my on my foot uh trying to push it down onto my foot and i think i even tried one where the ball was pretty much completely sideways what they quickly did was change my action to more of a end of the ball to the end of your palm let your fingers come around it as they will with different hand shapes and sizes let that happen use that natural angle which is a 30 degree angle to then mold your drop around i was trying to do things like that i was trying to drop it completely right from the top it wasn't working they changed my hand position now with the rugby ball i feel that because there's more surface area and because the ball is lighter you can actually bring it round just just slightly so i would say that an ideal angle to aim for with a rugby ball to do a spiral punt would be a 45 degree angle and so once i learned how to do that it was a matter of practicing and i'm not going to say that i've been practicing i practiced for a couple of days then i'd leave it for six months i'd come back to it for a day i'd get pretty good and then i'd leave it for another year and that's the way it's been which is unfortunate which goes back to the epiphany that i said i had earlier today which is you've got to do this man you've got to you've got to give back to the community that is stuck with you on youtube for so long either way the one difference from American football to rugby is indeed the predominant use of a spiral punt over an end over end punt what we've seen in the last few years is more Australians sadly no New Zealanders but certainly more Australians come from the world of rugby and Australian rules and take that drop punt action over to America as they attempt to kick for an American football college team so what's that what that's done is really mix it up as far as what action prior to the punt these teams are doing these special teams and for for an end over end punt which is the Australian version they do like to roll out to the left or right depending on what foot you're going to kick with and get that get some momentum rolling out to the right what that means is that their linemen in front of them have to roll out and block in front of the kicker like that so it's changed it's what i'm trying to say is it's it's become more popular and it's become you know pretty mainstream pretty accepted for a kicker to have both a spiral punt and an end over end drop punt that's the first difference and that is the you know through through going going through the journey of of learning American football going down to pro kick getting taught from the best that Australia and New Zealand had to offer and bringing that back into rugby i feel like just with that practice over the years be it very sporadic the thought or the action of dropping the ball in the field of play for a spiral punt has just become that much more comfortable to do and to think about the second difference is with a place kick and one of the first things that i realized is that the place kicker on an american football team has a set routine a set action it uh regardless of the distance away from the goalposts that may not be true but that's what i've observed i feel like post no no no that is true and pretty much every kicker is uniform in this right so i don't know who created it originally but it works and there's a reason why every single kicker pretty much from what i've seen has this certain action and it is it really doesn't matter how many steps it is but it's three steps back two steps to the side what it is fundamentally is a really short concise crisp easily replicatable run up three steps you've got your actually no it's two steps you've got you you line up i'll do it in a second you line up with your lead foot facing the ball that is considered your first step you have the opportunity to really lean into it if need be it's one two and kick there are guys smacking over 60 meter goals with with with that action with two steps and i saw that and uh and i i took it in the next time it came to mind is when i was playing rugby for littleton in christ church in 2020 and i had my opportunity i finally had my opportunity to take the role as kicker and the reason they gave me the opportunity to be kicker is because and they'd given me shit for this earlier they had seen some of the tutorial videos that i've got on youtube and so i felt a bit of pressure but it's pressure that i thought you know what this is my time i'm going to step up and if the opportunity comes for me to a penalty or a conversion i will happily give it a go i think their kicker was off that day and so it was my time to do it and unfortunately because of uh my lack of practice sadly i kind of relied on myself in the moment to think back and think back to which runner was the most successful for me and i chose the run-up that i've used for a few years there's really no method to it and that's the difference there is no method to it yes i take the same amount of steps yes it looks the same from the outside but in my head there is nothing about any of these run-ups that is the same and what that causes me to do and unfortunately what that caused me to do on the day that i wanted it to work so bad is i fucked them up my run-up was too long too far away from the ball and it was inconsistent now what that made me do and the main difference and the the reason why i have completely changed my run-up for my place kicks to that same two-step action is because of this moment this was the pivotal moment i was like holy shit man you got to get this shit under control what i'm doing is allowing myself way too much time way too much distance between myself and the ball and this is just for me for someone who who is very inconsistent with their runner for someone who has a you know five steps or six steps away from the ball and hits it sweetly every single time because they're practiced and practiced fucking good on you that is amazing dedication but for me all having all that space between me and the ball allowed me to you know force me to do is to think about it and rush it and think that i had to end up sprinting towards the ball to get to generate any power and what i've realized through seeing those guys in american football slam 60 meter kicks with two steps is that you don't if you've got jet if you've got decent power if you have power and you're not afraid to use it if you have power through the lower body there is no need to have a five or six step run-up even from 50 to 60 meters because you've got the power and the way that they stand up with their lead foot forward means that you've literally got because the thing with having power and i've always had power through my feet the thing with having power is that if it is slightly off when you hit the ball the ball is not going to go straight at least it'll have heaps of power but i mean the worst thing in the world right i've played lots of soccer lots of rugby the worst thing is to know you've got fucking power in your boot but to unfortunately shank the ball due to thinking about it too much or putting too much power into it thinking that you have to put 100 every single time into it the worst thing in the world is to know that you've got loads of power if only you had the accuracy and that's been the story of my life and i didn't swear on purpose i'm sick of that cannot bring rugby content to the channel if i'm gonna swear so i think i've talked way too much i really hope that someone out there is enjoying this because i'm enjoying it and you know i'm so stoked that i had that epiphany today so you know two major changes from in in my game of rugby uh rugby union or rugby league but in this case rugby union two major changes in my game not that i'm playing it at the moment that i've taken from american football uh one the acceptance that a spiral punt is actually really useful and it's actually not that hard if you learn to drop it properly now i did say that you probably would want to take from 30 degrees out to 45 in my opinion with a bigger lighter rugby ball but that may just be me that's not necessarily true i'm just thinking about it don't quote me on that but either way that's the first difference the second difference is myself completely changing my run up to kick the ball off of a tee and it is a run up with two steps and a follow through and what that's allowed me to do for someone who suffers from putting way too much power into these things and just shanking it all the time thinking about it too much it's allowed me to actually feel comfortable in front of the ball because it's right there it's right in front of me it's not you know five six meters away which made me so anxious because like i said the last thing you want to do is to shank it and that's what i did and that is what i did on that day on that fateful day i had two kicks from about 40 meters out each shank both of them they went out to the right they weren't as bad as what you could have but they certainly didn't go over and so i actually near on half time we had a try under the posts i ran up i kept it i actually did get two points that day i've got a conversion went over the posts they took me off at half time and then i never went back the next two games i actually stayed off the whole entire game no disrespect it's all good i was just happy to be part of the team but following that i actually quit the rugby team and devoted my time and efforts into my bodybuilding show which i then did in september of 2020 so guys that's it man that is it i'm gonna put a few examples of me demonstrating both kicks after this i hope you guys have enjoyed as much as i have it's a bit different isn't it it's a bit different but being that this is the first time i've strapped on any any rugby boots in the last year it's very very rewarding and i get upset man i get upset because i have sacrificed a lot of my best sporting years i haven't sacrificed it for anything though you know what i mean i've just been so anxious um there's a lot of a lot of anxiety and maybe youtube's had something to do that with that but uh either way if you have enjoyed this video please hit that like button please subscribe if you haven't and let's get this channel rolling again you know i don't know what video should come or will come would come coulda shoulda woulda i don't know if this will be my only one but i doubt it because i'm enjoyed it now