To Tape or Not To Tape?

There are certain points when you realize that you have gone pretty far down the rabbit hole. So it is with the decision regarding whether or not to tape my lyra, aka aerial hoop. I wouldn’t go so far to say that I agonized over the decision, but I gave it a lot of thought, a lot. Then, it occurred to me what a strange place I had come to that this was a real question for me, and a somewhat weighty one at that.

If you start getting into aerials, I think that you almost inevitably arrive at a place where equipment begins to be a thing. You realize that you need to be able to practice on your own if you are ever going to gain any proficiency. And, if you are lucky enough to have access to a practice space (a whole set of challenges on its own), you must to have your own equipment. But aerial equipment is not cheap (or if it is cheap you probably do not want it). Whatever it is that you desire - silks, trapeze, lyra, straps - will generally end up costing about $400 or more when you add in the rigging equipment that you will need to hang it. Since each piece is a pretty big-ticket item, you want to make sure that you are getting exactly what you want.

For a newbie, equipment purchase is a bit bewildering. Suffice it to say, that there is no aerial equipment showroom. Instead, everything must be ordered online, sight unseen, often with no returns. So this is when you really lean on your instructors, fellow aerialists, and tidbits of advice sprinkled throughout the internet, in the hope of making sound decisions about what to buy. Fortunately, most of the people who sell aerial equipment online seem to be practitioners themselves, so they are knowledgeable and willing to answer questions to make sure you are getting what you want. That is, assuming you can figure out what you want, like how much stretch do I want in my aerial fabric or what diameter hoop will be right for my size and proportions? When an aerial friend of mine told me recently that she was looking into buying a new trapeze (and offering to sell me her old one), she said that it would take her a couple of months to figure out what she wanted to buy. I understood that completely.

Fortunately, with my first purchase, silks, my instructor Sharon guided me through the options. Although I absolutely love my silks, I still messed it up a bit. I decided to buy enough fabric for 20-foot-high rigging, in hopes that I will one day have such a practice space (which is a whole other story centered around the enormous hole in my backyard where there will be a practice-room addition some day). But now, even with some of the fabric knotted up at the top, I still have pools of it on the ground at the 15-foot-high space where I practice now. So the question arises, do I cut some off or just muddle through in anticipation of that glorious day when I have a space that fits my silks?

When I decided to purchase my lyra, I was a bit more on my own. Discussion with another aerial friend convinced me that I wanted a lyra with a particular type of tab, i.e. the metal fitting on the loop to which you connect the rigging. After much online research, I finally found someone who sold hoops with the type of tab I wanted. But it was just the hoop for sale. So I needed to figure out all the rigging for myself. Also, the hoop was sold untaped. Many aerial suppliers will tape your hoop for an extra fee, but not the particular dealer who had the hoop with the tabs that I wanted. So I got my hoop, raw in a sense, just the bare metal. When she came, she was pretty and shiny in her bareness. I had read that some people just use the bare untaped hoop, so I decided to try it that way first for a while to see if I liked it. I was aware that most people tape in order to make the hoop easier to grip and, purportedly, to provide some cushion for the body (I am still dubious about how mush cushion tape provides).

So began a process of weighing the pros and cons of taping my hoop. Part of my hesitation to tape was that I would need to do it myself and was concerned that I would make a botch of it. Finally, my instructor Kate convinced me through a series of not so subtle hints (e.g. “you might be able to do that move if your lyra were taped”) that I would be better off with tape. Having finally decided to tape, more decisions and research followed, i.e. what tape should I buy, what is the best method for taping, and the all important question of what color? But finally, my lyra is taped. And I now have a new appreciation for the fact that the demands of aerials extend even beyond what I am trying to do on the apparatus.