OK - how do the figure skaters do all those spins without barfing?

[rurallib]

Or at least falling down like a drunken sot?

I was watching one who must have done 20 or so spins on one toe while she held her other foot in the air and all I could think of was how discombobulated I would be.

How do they do it? Do they take dramamine? Do they get immune to it over time? They not only don't barf or fall, they usually follow the spins with some incredibly graceful skating. I'd be on my ass for an hour at least.

[bucolic_frolic]

1. I understand your question.

Don't ask me to turn around 4x fast. I think it's genetic, biological. Inner ear.

[wcmagumba]

2. Good question, I almost barf while watching the spins...they still look cool...

[rurallib]

4. That is about what happened. I watched this woman and thought

I was going to upchuck myself. So then it made me wonder how do they overcome what seems to be a very basic response to the spinning.

I must learn to turn my head.

[ProfessorGAC]

3. They Call It Spotting

If you notice, as they spin their head stays still as long as possible, focusing their eyes on one stationary spot, then they move the head faster to catch up, but for a shorter time.
They don't get disoriented by a constantly moving background and the quick stop after they turned the head allows inertia to get the blood back where it belongs.
Ballet dancers have been doing this for a century or more.
Also, people who can't do that, or those for whom it doesn't work, get dizzy and their performance never achieves their potential. We never see those folks on TV.

[rurallib]

5. Thanks! Gawd that must take a lot of training to do that.

[EYESORE 9001]

6. Some people are just naturally resistant to the spin

Like myself, for instance. I’m far from an Olympic skater, but I had a really cool swing when I was a kid. The ropes were parachute cord hung from a 20-ft-high tree branch. I could wind it up until my feet didn’t touch the ground - tighter with assistance. Spin for about 200 turns - faster if you tucked-in. The ropes would become a tightly-coiled, muscular propulsion method. Newbies often succumbed to motion sickness. It became notorious in the neighborhood as the spin’n’barf machine.

[rurallib]

7. I was wondering if there were people who were kind of immune from the spin response

Man, that sounds like a superpower to me. I get sick on a merry-go-round. I was no fun to go to the fair with.

[EYESORE 9001]

8. Are you familiar with the Rock-O-Plane?

Some people refused to ride with me when I ‘drove’, as I would set up momentum to spin madly

[rurallib]

9. that was one that would make me barf just looking at it

to stay the least I never got in one of those things

[EYESORE 9001]

12. I guess me & good ol' Ralphie Wiggums got something in common

[EYESORE 9001]

13. This one time? on the Rock-O-Plane?

I was on a ‘performance’ run - solo, since no one wanted to go with me. Immediately after the carny moved my cage to the next position, I released the locking mechanism and I rotated to a fully upside-down position. I heard gasps from the crowd below, including a retch or two, along with people proclaiming they weren’t getting on now. Carny yelled, ‘ride hasn’t started yet.’ I replied, ‘oops!’, hoping he wouldn’t kick me off. I figured he’d rather let me go ahead than wrestle with that cage.

[johnnyfins]

10. I got stuck in one of those.

Ocean City, NJ. Upside down at the top. Almost an hour. With my former girlfriend, now wife.

[UTUSN]

11. Plus, the scariness like for the gymnasts losing bearings in flips.