To the Moon & Back: Gravity boot suspension
Supplemental to class and not intended as stand-alone material
Introduce self and class
My primary focus is dynamic, mobile self-suspensions
I like to explore rope and mobility
This is not suspension 101 or an uplines-focused class. Hopefully you read the pre-requs!
I have no idea who first created or named the “gravity boot” – I wish I knew! I do tie it differently from the way I was originally taught.
This class is both self and partner suspension-friendly
Our philosophy is that both tyers and flyers can learn from self-suspension techniques
Self-rescue
Practice the problem-solving techniques involved in going outside of what you might typically do/tie.
Self-suspension modifications can be helpful when the flyer is significantly larger than the tier
Disclaimers
There is no magical harness that is perfect for every person in every suspension. I can promise only that this harness will not work for some of you, and that sucks because I wish I could teach something that works for everyone – I want everyone to be happy and successful in my classes!
There are classes upon classes about arms-in harnesses – strappado, TK, tenshi, arms front, and so on – and absolutely none of those harnesses work for me, but I’m still happy that those classes exist.
It’s ok that not everything works for everyone!
Gravity boot inversion should not be your first inversion. It should not be your second or third inversion! It is quite advanced from a flyer perspective.
The actual rope techniques involved in this harness aren’t necessarily difficult
We will present options for self-suspension or partnered (some things just cannot be done as a self-suspension), and also options to make it suck more or suck less
Safety
#1 Risk: Getting stuck
Gravity boot (or ankle cuff) inversions are notoriously easy to get into, but can be impossible to get out of
The Abyss style: “I knew this was a one-way trip, but you knew I had to come.”
Technora shows this as part of her sequence, pages 358 - 362 in Soaring & Exploring.
I have seen a flyer to climb their own leg and manage to get out…But, I sure can’t do it.
You will need to completely unload the foot in order to get it unclipped
ALWAYS have a spotter, never leave someone alone in this tie.
Keep an “oh fuck” bail-out harness to quickly get out
Hip
Chest
Ideally both
Nerve damage
Generally, in bondage: relatively common and relatively serious.
Being more distal, such as the feet rather than the thighs, tends to be protective
Distal loading tends to be lower risk for major nerve injury because you’re working with smaller, more localized nerve branches rather than large proximal nerves that control whole muscle groups.
Unlike injuries higher up at the knee, damage at the ankle generally spares the major muscles that lift the foot, meaning you typically will not have a full foot drop.
Nerves won’t be in the exact same spot for everyone, and everyone has different degrees of vulnerability!
Specific nerves
Deep peroneal nerve, aka deep fibular nerve
Compression: Tight wraps around the ankle (especially the anterior ankle), where you might find shoe rims
Stretch: Activities like ballet that involve prolonged extreme downward bending of the foot (plantar flexion) can overstretch the nerve and cause damage.
Ex: Ski boot neuropathy, cast injuries
Symptoms include foot pain and sensory disturbance.
Motor symptoms (uncommon) can include toe extension (lift).
Sensory: a very specific patch: the web space between the big toe and second toe
Others:
Tibial nerve → medial/posterior compression
Sural nerve → lateral/posterior edge loading
Rope incident group – one lone report: “Cumulative nerve compression injury in the left medial branch of the superficial fibular nerve from gravity boots and more” – numbness in 1st toe, resolved in a few days. Involved 3 other suspensions, including an agura.
Consider tying a gravity boot over an actual boot. Cheating!
Other risks
Circulation
Pale → reduced arterial flow
Purple/blue → venous congestion
Because the foot is elevated, it tends to have somewhat less venous congestion.
Muscle strains, skin irritation
One-foot suspension creates:
High force through a single joint chain
Less redundancy than two-foot or harness systems
Psychology: fear aspect. Recommend trying to slip it off!
Transitions: slow, not fast!
Learning to distinguish warning signs of damage from sensations that are intense but not harmful is a crucial skill for being in rope. If anything feels like “bad pain,” come down!
Body awareness
We will be transitioning from a hip and/or chest harness into two gravity boots (one if you’re feeling spicy).
Getting your feet into position while your hips are attached to the hardpoint can require tricky body mechanics, especially for self-tiers.
On the ground: practice “happy baby” pose
Partnered: someone else doing this to your legs while your torso is straight tends to be much easier
Self-suspenders: flexing your back while bringing in your feet
One leg: more about hip flexibility for external rotation
Both legs: can involve lower back flexibility
Hypermobility
I have EDS traits and a degree of hypermobility, and have tied these on people with extremely hypermobile ankles
Hips: internal and external rotation
Static vs. dynamic stability:
Static stability = joint structures, ligaments, etc
Dynamic stability = muscles, including strength and control
Hypermobility = poor static stability, requiring extra awesome dynamic stability
Extreme mobility decreases stability and requires strengthening of the muscles around the joint, so they can hold it in place. Actively engage your muscles!
Hypermobile people often have less reliable joint position sense/proprioception, especially at end range.
Supplies, set-up
This is the only time I use 8mm nylon… highly recommend it for gravity boots!
At the very least, nylon rather than hemp or jute will make a big difference.
Mine are custom lengths (~13 feet)
If you want to do two feet, ideal to have some distance between them (not ankles up against each other) – so you want an internally divided ring or a larger rigging plate, not a circle ring or just two carabiners
Set-up and height
Minimum attachment height to keep the flyer’s head off the ground: if you are clipping a carabiner directly from the gravity boot to the ring or rigging plate, hang the ring or rigging plate and have the flyer put their spread hand with thumb on the top of their head. If the ring is not touching the pinky finger, you should be ok.
You want to get the gravity boots attached as high as possible, while being safely reachable by the tier/spotter.
A point for a gravity boot inversion will often be higher than you would normally want to set your point for a standard suspension
Consider hanging two points, with the gravity boot point adjacent to the point you’re mainly using and hung as high as possible. This can also minimize the amount of hip flexibility required, but makes reaching more difficult for self-suspenders.
If you are doing partnered suspension and the flyer is significantly taller than the tyer, your options are:
1) Use a ladder or step stool to attach and detach the feet
2) Phone a friend / get a “service tall” to help
3) Set up a formal pulley above the ring
The absolute “if wishes were fishes” is to have a full aerial pulley, 3:1 or 4:1. Then you can just tie and attach on the ground, get pulled up, and get lowered when you’re done!
Circus Gear: Their pulley kit is overkill, but they sell the parts individually, and they're often the same stuff as AE but slightly cheaper because they're unbranded; also, they ship quickly, and their customer service is amazing
VerSales: specialty rigging store, good if you know what you're looking for. They sell Tech12 rope by the foot. The price jumps quickly for larger diameters: the 5/8" is $11.44/ft, while the 3/8" is still ridiculously strong but only $4.02/ft.
Body Awareness and Habituation
Differentiating warning signs of damage from intense but not dangerous sensations is a crucial skill for being in rope.
Pain is entirely mediated by the brain. Pain is your brain’s somewhat paranoid guess about how much danger you’re in.
Many factors moderate pain response! For example:
Fear or lack of confidence increases pain perception.
Doing something to yourself decreases pain perception. (Studies on college students zapping themselves support this.)
Swearing increases your pain tolerance.
It takes time to build up a tolerance to the “intense sensations” and emotions/fear associated with rope—your body learns that you felt all the things and then survived, and actually, that was fun!
This is related to the concepts of hedonic reversal and benign masochism, a term coined by scientist Paul Rozin referring to the “enjoyment of negative bodily reactions and feelings in the context of feeling safe, or pleasure at “mind over body.””
In the circus community, this is sometimes called peripheral desensitization.
This is the same process by which people learn to like spicy food (no one is born liking ghost peppers), riding roller coasters, or watching scary movies.
Inventory your body. Is anything tragic happening? Are you being damaged? If not, try relaxing into the sensation, breathing, etc.
When continuously exposed to a fixed stimulus, neurons become steadily less sensitive to it until they stop responding. Anything habitually encountered tends toward invisibility—the more we see a thing, the less we see it. This is like putting on a sweater that feels scratchy at first but is no longer noticeable after a few minutes.
You can also build a tolerance to spinning—this has been studied! “It is a defining characteristic of human sensory and motor systems that they habituate with repeated use…with repeated sessions on a centrifuge, the experienced symptoms of motion sickness become less severe” – Adapting to Artificial Gravity at High Rotational Speeds, NASA Astrophysics Data System, 2002.
That quote also makes a great mantra; I use it all the time when I’m in a challenging self-tie.
Sequence
The full sequence includes options for both self- and partnered suspension. Some modifications for this sequence are left as an exercise for the reader because there are so many options, and I can’t tell you what will suit you best.
Self-suspension for the full sequence
Self-suspension is much harder, involves different choices, and you will not be able to fully drop your “bail out” upline like you can with partnered. It relies on one of these:
1) Extreme endurance: lots and lots of incremental walking uplines up and down while in stress positions.
2) Extreme strength: core and upper body to lift yourself up with a strap or just by hanging onto the ring or rigging plate
3) Extreme lack of pride and willingness to be flexible in the definition of “self-suspension”: phone a friend. All your spotter needs to do is clip and unclip carabiners, and they can make your life infinitely easier.
4) Extreme upline control: never lock that foot line. Not an answer for a “pure” suspension, but that's what we've got.
Alternative framing (from Angel): escaping from a foot hang as a saving throw negotiation with the DM:
High Constitution: work those uplines!
High Dexterity: one-handed lock-off while inverted
High Strength: just pull/hold yourself up from a full inversion
High Intelligence: "use your head" by putting a strap around it (there is actually no way we have found to purely work “smarter not harder” for this one)
High Charisma: phone a friend!
High Wisdom: make better choices!
Common theme: You can get into a position, but you can’t tie off, or even clip/unclip, in that position because of angles, needing two hands to hold yourself up, etc.
Starting harnesses:
Chest harness, ideally one that can load from the front and the back
Partnered: You can do arms-in if that’s within everyone’s risk profile. Trade-offs: breathing vs. arm nerves…
Hip harness – whatever is your most comfy one
I like being able to load from the thighs for a true inversion. Examples: swiss seat, woven hip harness, butt rainbow, 3-column tie variations. This isn’t required.
Rigging set-up:
Self: pre-attach carabiners for the gravity boots to your plate or ring
Carabiner - strap - carabiner for chest line
This helps reduce vector forces on your body when you are close to the ring, trying to attach your feet
If you want to do a ridiculous partnered trick we will show, you want this clipped above the swivel or to its own swivel
If you are self-suspending, recommend clipping to the bottom of the swivel
1) Attaching the chest harness
1a) Self or partnered, easier: chest harness attached from the front
1b) Partnered, harder: Chest harness from the back
A chest harness will feel a lot different in a face-up with a hanger from the back than from the front
Attaching the chest from the back and then loading in a face-up position loads across the front of the harness. Attaching from the front will distribute to the sides and back.
2) Raise the hips (as high as possible)
Self-suspenders, you want to be able to reach this upline while fully inverted. A standard length upline usually will not allow this. Options:
Use an extra-long upline (~40 feet)
Use a strap or a 15-foot piece of rope to make the hanger
Could add an ankle, foot, or thigh cuff for additional support if needed.
Self, chest from the front – your chest will likely end up too low to reach to tie off your hips as high as they need to be, if you’re leaning back into your chest line. Options:
1) Endurance: Tie off the hip high enough to keep your head off the ground, then raise the chest, then raise the hip again.
2) Strength: Treat it like a single line hip raise, sit up to tie off the hip high, then raise the chest (or just unclip it).
3) Friendship: Have a spotter help with any step of this process.
3) Attach gravity boots
We will talk about attachment options later; for now, we will go with the option that maintains max height, which is clipping in with a carabiner. Everything is trade-offs!
Attach the carabiners to the feet first, then back to the plate.
The direction of the carabiners matters a lot! You want to avoid twisting the cuff.
4) Full gravity boot inversion
1) Easier: lower chest (self-suspenders: do not completely untie), then hip.
2) Harder: lower hip, then chest
V —> face down flip-through —> shrimp
This only works with a chest harness from the back, only works for partnered, and also totally sucks
Requires very active bottoming
From the chest and gravity boots, lower the chest slowly while the flyer rolls through into face down. Then raise the chest line for a face down.
Consider detaching one foot
To self-rescue, keep the upline and/or have a strap, and also have a spotter, of course.
Keeping the hip line
Tie it off to the front of your chest harness
Partnered: suggest not untying the hip harness hanger/upline
You want a bailout option
It is hard to remake the hanger with legs loaded
Keeping the chest line
You can keep a little bit of tension on the chest line, so that if you straighten your legs, you will be supported by it, but if you curl your chest and engage your leg, you’ll be in a foot hang. This also applies if you tie off the hip to the chest – you can offload into both.
Getting from two feet to one foot: options
1) Pelican hook on one of them
2) Raise hips, unhook one, lower again
3) Brute force: lift the flyer, give the flyer a strap or piece of rope to take the load off one foot
Being in gravity boots
Supportive engagement – the leg is awake and participating, not hanging loose
Muscles are on enough to share the load, but not straining
For one boot, not trying to square hips
5) Getting down
Takeoffs are optional…landings are mandatory.
Partnered, easiest: attach the hip, raise back up (flyer can help, this isn’t a dead lift), then unclip the feet and proceed as you normally would to lower from a hip harness inversion, such as attach the chest from the front, lower hips, etc.
Self:
1) Endurance: walk the hip line and chest line back up, unclip, walk them back down
2) Strength: Use a strap
3) Friendship: Have your spotter help
Gravity boot tie-along
Pages 129 - 130 of Tying & Flying
Woven and unwoven versions
Tension
Does not have to be super tight! Set tension to the underlying structures (muscle and bone), not to squish. If your foot is squishy, you should have that looked into.
Keep your foot pointed to keep a consistent shape
On the bottom of the foot – finish with half hitches.
Gravity stirrup variation (pages 253 - 255 of Soaring & Exploring)
Attaching
Everything is trade-offs in this world…
1) Actually tying off a normal way with a hanger and upline
Advantages: you can also lower in a normal way
Disadvantages: major height loss. Potential for tie-off error.
Quick-release option (speed vs. security)
2) Carabiner clip-in
Advantages: save as much height as possible
Disadvantages: carabiner vs. foot
Hook goes toward the toes, want the head of the carabiner at the toes and gate facing away from the foot, with the spine against the sole of your foot
If you clip the carabiner in a twisted orientation, it will torque your foot or cuff rope.
Carabiners will walk around the sole of the foot. They might need help with the process.
Practice this lying on the ground.
3) Climbing strap (shortest possible: usually 1 foot)
Advantages: nice on foot, rated, redundancy for gravity boot (it cannot come untied no matter what)
Disadvantages: height loss
4) Amsteel loop
Advantages: nice on foot, saves some height vs. the climbing strap
Disadvantages: relies on rock-solid technique to create the loop
Psychology
Fear increases pain
It can often feel like this will slip off, and that can make it very scary
Try to slip the gravity boot off while it is loaded. Generally, this is very difficult, often impossible.
Then try to tie it very loosely and slip it off. You will note that it becomes an ankle cuff and still does not fail.
Partials
Gravity boot only
Setting height: place the bottom carabiner so that it is at your wrist while kneeling
Tie off options:
Partnered: Just like normal
Self-suspenders: hang onto upline, overhand knot, or tie off to chest harness or hip harness
Going from two gravity boots to one – you take away a foot, but get more of your body on the ground.
Roll from face up to face down
Option: upline hanger with just one upline from both feet
Gravity boot plus chest (side, front, back)
Add waist rope/hip rope “open loop” style
Teach and practice three grips
Just…grip
Wrapping palm (monkey grip?)
Wrapping wrist
Unlocked upline self-suspension demo
This is what you should not do; let that be a lesson to you
Tying overhand knots in uplines
This is within my risk profile; it might not be within yours. There are class after class on upper-body harnesses and jute uplines that are outside my risk profile!
I would only do this with 6mm POSH or stronger.
My first gravity boot performance…
2025 Portland Fetish Ball gravity boot performance
