Common 7-club and 8-club patterns
Prerequisite: Basic Synchronous Passing Patterns | Next: Four-handed siteswaps or tedious synchronous patterns.
There are many more variations of synchronous patterns, especially when exploring 7-club and 8-club patterns. They are still all synchronous in that both passers throw at the same time, but they may not both make the same throw, or throw from the same hand.
We already introduced early doubles as a crossing double pass in basic 6-club synchronous patterns. Those are a good way to practice double passes. In fact, continuous early doubles in 6-club three-count (after a first normal pass) are a good way to practice doubles with both hands:
7-club two-count. Many passers learn 7-club two-count as a milestone. Being one-sided, I consider this traditional passing, not modern passing and recommend the four-handed siteswap 7-club three-count instead.
The conventional setup is the following: Both passers, throw straight double passes with every right hand; passer A starts with four clubs and a double pass as the first throw; passer B starts with three clubs and a double pass on the second beat. That is, passer B throws a right-hand pass when passer A throws a left-handed self and vice versa.
When learning 7-club two-count aim for consistent passes. Since both passers cannot see their passes land, provide feedback on placement and spin. A good strategy is to remember the spot on the ceiling where the first club peaks, to then try throwing all following passes such that they peak in the same place – consistency is usually more important than the exact placement.
A tiny bit of theory. Why are early doubles crossing when doubles in 7-club two-count are straight? Why do passers start on different beats in 7-club two-count?
The patterns are indeed from the same family. By default, passers in synchronous patterns both start with the same hand and throw their singles straight and their doubles crossing. However, it is also possible to throw singles crossing and doubles straight, when one passer starts with the opposite hand.
Strictly following the theory, the most obvious approach for 7-club two-count would be for both passers cross their doubles and for both passers to start at the same time with a right hand throw, which is a right-handed pass for passer A and a right-handed self for passer B. This is actually a fairly nice pattern to allow one passer to practice left-handed doubles.
By flipping straight and crossing passes and having passer B start with the left hand, we get a pattern with straight doubles.
In practice, passer B often leaves out that first left-handed self to start on a right-handed pass one beat later, resulting in the conventional start shown above. However, actually starting with a left-handed self can help with timing.
7-club four-count. To explore one-sided triple passes, 7-club four-count is a well known, albeit boring, pattern.
6-count popcorn. One of several one-sided popcorn patterns, named after the trelfs that pop up on alternating sides. Can also be thrown with heff-heff instead of trelf-self. Again, notice that, conventionally, we again throw the doubles straight and passer B starts with the left hand (but often skips the first self).
7-club pass-pass-self. With odd-length patterns, there are no synchronous patterns where both passers throw the same sequence. The most common 7-club pass-pass-self pattern has passer A throws single-double-self and passer B throws double-self-double (3p 4p 3 vs. 4p 3 4p):
Another common variation is double-self-single versus single-double-heff (4p 3 3p vs. 3p 4p 4):
As discussed above, all of these can be also passed with crossing single passes and straight double passes if one passer starts left-handed.
Other variations of 7-club pass-pass-self, often with one side being substantially harder than the other, are:
- 3p 3 3p vs. 4 4p 4p
- 3p 3p 4 vs. 4p 4p 3
- 3p 3p 4 vs. 4p 4 3p
- 3 3p 4p vs. 5 3p 3p
- 3p 3p 4 vs. 5 3p 3p
- 4p 4p 1 vs. 4p 5 3p
In the appendix, we list a few more patterns with triple passes.
7-club synchronous three-counts. For three-counts that are not four-handed siteswaps, there are many possible variations that again combine two different throw sequences; none of them are common patterns:
- 3p 3 4 vs. 4 4 3p
- 3p 4 4 vs. 4p 3 3
- 3 4 4p vs. 4p 3 3
- 3 3p 3 vs. 4p 4 4
- 3 3p 3 vs. 5 3p 4
In the appendix, we list a few more of these patterns.
8-club patterns (not two-count). For eight clubs there are obvious sequences of doubles and heffs that mirror standard 6-club patterns: 4p 4 4 (8-club three count), 4p 4p 4 (8-club pass-pass-self), 4p (8-club one count), and 4p 4 4 4 (8-club four count). These are usually passed with crossing doubles, but can also be passed with straight doubles if one passer starts left-handed. For passers used to 9s in four-handed siteswaps it may be useful to lower the double passes a bit.