Devil-Sticking a Club

A devilstick is a piece of circus equipment consisting of a long central stick, tapering from both ends down to its thinnest point at the centre. It is kept in the air with 2 smaller hand sticks, which are used to hit the central stick back and forth between them. A wide range of different tricks are possible with a devilstick, and club jugglers sometimes adapt them for their own use. Here a club is held in each hand, serving as a pair of hand sticks, and the third is kept in the middle and treated as the devilstick:

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Hold the 'hand stick' clubs by the bodies, so that the handles point forward and can be used for hitting. The central club will be easier to keep aloft if you keep the body uppermost.

It's not really worth trying to learn this trick unless you can devil-stick already - it is a good deal harder to do with clubs, and you would be much better off practising on the real thing.

The design of your clubs has a big effect on the difficulty of this trick. Smooth one-piece plastic clubs make it nearly impossible, whereas clubs with soft spongy handles and thin bodies are ideal.