Hart Attack / Helicopter


click here for the Chris Denison video

...and for the Steve video

And for the HELICOPTER video

CLICK HERE for step by step instructions with pictures.

To accomplish this amazing contortion, its a prerequisite to be good at supermen seat grabs. 
Working up to it: When you take off from your jump, pulll your legs and hand off, grab the grab hole (just like normal) but don't kick your body and legs far behind (or above) the bike. This time, make a motion where your head stays low and forward on the bike, not any further back than the middle of the seat. Work on getting comfortable with moving your head and torso down and use your hand not to extend and push the bike away, but to pullyour body up on the bike. When you get this down good, work on curving your legs behind your back a little. This will familiarize your body with the feeling of being inverted. Once your can do these motions, your hart attacks will look like funny, contorted supermen seat grabs (see pic above). They won't be full out extended. To work on extension, you must push off with your hand when in the position described above. As you push with your hand, straiten your torso and kick those legs high above your head. While extending your arm, its a good idea to pull yourself forward at the same time to keep your body above the center of the bike, that way you won't drift back into a standard superman seat grab. To get back on the bike, you must pull your legs down while rotating your torso, and when the legs are parallel with the bike you must pull your legs back on with the grab hand, just as in a superman seat grab.

Helicopter:

Hart attack indian airs, also known as "Helicopters" are a combination of a hart attack and, well, an indian air.....
To learn these, get comfortable on your hart attacks, or hart attack look backs (whichever you are comfortable on)

Work on doing a fully extended hart attack, then rotate your hips a litle after your full extension. Practice this several times until you can get your feet slightly sissor kicked (indian air). Once comfortable, you can try changing your technique a little to help your extension, like so:

As you come off the jump, keep your body and head low to the bike when you make your grab. At the point when you normally would rotate your upper body into the hart attack position, instead rotate your shoulders and torso like a fully extended indian air. As you are rotating, instead of pushing backwards (like a normal seat grab indian aid) keep your arm (thats holding onto the bars) bent slightly, and push your body (with your seat grab arm) up off the bike while your rotating. This will get you into an almost-hart attack position. The real extension on helicopters comes from when you look back. Don't rotate your head sideways like a conventional indian air, look back underneath your body while rotating. As you do this and thrust your legs to be crossed, allow your hips to move with your legs. However, you can see from the video that when I would do Helicopters I hardly would twist my hips; which gave my helicopters a distinct look. However, most riders will want to twist their hips at least a tad - which makes the scissor kick of your legs come easier. As you twist (either your hips, legs, whatever) you'll then push down with your upper body, and that will elevate your shoulders (which are now inverted) off of the bike.

Now you have a fully extended hart attack indian air!!