If there is one thing that Ibara High School in Japan does really well, it’s sports. Although, not the typical sports that you might expect, such as baseball and soccer. Ibara is well-known around the world for its incredible rhythmic gymnastics team.
It’s a sport that involves dance, calisthenics, and gymnastics all combined into one.
Once you see the incredible flexibility of the Ibara RG squad, your mind will be blown.
The six boys on the team all gathered in the middle of the arena a few years ago for the 2019 Inter-High School Championships as hundreds of people in the audience looked on. Their routine from that day is something that you have to see to believe.
The Ibara team began with most of their group upside-down, immediately showing the judges how flexible they were.
The boy in the middle didn’t let the audience down either.
He effortlessly touched his toes against his head without even straining a muscle.
The team makes it look so easy!
For example, imagine purposely falling over backwards and softly landing on your shoulders. That’s just one of the incredible moves that the six high school boys completed.
For over three minutes, they launched themselves through the air as the crowd sat watching in awe.
While competitive rhythmic gymnastics first emerged in the Soviet Union in the 1940s, there are now competitions hosted in dozens of countries around the world every year.
Japan has created its own variant of the sport for men that takes elements of the other styles and makes it completely its own.
It is occasionally referred to as synchronized tumbling since the movements often involve carefully orchestrated acrobatics among group members. It’s not surprising either that a number of people involved in Japanese men’s rhythmic gymnastics over the years have gone on to perform in the Cirque du Soleil.
We wouldn’t be shocked if some of the boys from the Ibara High School team end up becoming famous one day as well.
After all, their video on YouTube has accumulated close to 5 million views already in just a little over a year. We’d say that’s a pretty good start.
“I’ve never seen anything like this before…I didn’t know people could move in such perfect synchronicity. Precision moves…they must have practiced for thousands of hours,” wrote one YouTube commenter.
People couldn’t believe how flexible the boys were, and especially, how perfectly synchronized their moves were.
“As an American, I’ve seen some great choreography and skill at the high school level, but N O T H I N G compares to what I just saw. Makes our high school competitions look like trash,” joked user Katie West.
If you are a proud American, those are fighting words. However, once you watch the video for yourself, you’ll likely find yourself nodding your head in agreement.
Our favorite part of the performance was when everyone was jumping around doing flips at the same time.
Looking at the photo of the six boys, it appears very chaotic, however, we assure you that it was the total opposite. It all sort of just flowed together.
In the end, the Ibara High School team finished to roaring applause from everyone in the stands, but the real question was, “what did the judges think?”.
How did the Ibara High School team do in the competition?
It turns out, the performance was enough to earn them first place in the competition that year. We’d say it was a really well-deserved award.
Check out the full video of the Japanese high school team’s rhythmic gymnastics performance below.
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