Trawling the internet archive I found this book.
I have only skimmed it but it seems fairly complete.

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I did find this passage quite funny  ;D

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Ha!  I didn't know that book wasn't already in every slinger's library.  ;D

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If Mr.Savage only needed 2 hours practice to become a master he must be a rare human indeed.

Joe, crafty use of double negatives will not result  in no retaliation.

😁👍

It seems that only from this book I see for the first time a clear shape of the number 8 in the trajectory of movement. Although at the same time it is not quite what we are used to considering a throw called "figure eight"? Or the illustration adds to the confusion? Is this a reason to raise the issue of names for this or that throwing style again?  :-?

In my opinion, my throw looks like a part of the trajectory of this movement and is more like a "figure 6".  ;D I tried to depict it in the second image. Except that the starting point is not above the head but at waist height, in front of me.  ;)

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I haven't looked at it for a long time, but I think the first image (that came from the book) is incorrect.  The second one is a better interpretation of Figure-8.  The first image is definitely a confusing though without showing the changes in arm and sling positions.

About a possible rename, good luck.  If you jump on YouTube and just punch in 'slinging figure 8', you'll find video after video of guys doing it properly (with the initial rotation in front and the second rotation behind the body).  Here's a 15 year old video of Aussie, one of the slinging.org OGs, demonstrating it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKz8CcPSRu0.  Whether the name makes 100% sense or not, it's what people (meaning slingers) know that movement as.  If someone tried to use a different name, they would likely just end up having to explain that whatever term they're using is the same as Figure-8 style.  Which begs the question, why not just say 'Figure-8' in the first place? :)

And a quick question.  Is that you in the gif?  Nice smooth movement. :thumb:

joe_meadmaker wrote on Mar 31^st, 2025 at 8:16pm:

Here's a 15 year old video of Aussie

Yes, everything you say is there, but my logic became this:
- I see the book mentioned in this topic, the first publication of which was in 1984, if you believe the Internet.
- in it I come across the same illustration that is the first in my post above, where the rotation in front of you is in the form of an eight, only horizontal, just called figure eight.
- then I imagine my movement (yeah, on the gif), I redraw it in the illustration that is the second in the post above, where the movement of the hand goes behind the back and I understand that this is less like an 8...

That's why I thought that perhaps this name originally referred to a slightly different movement than what we are used to now...

You could be right.  It's possible the name was a reference to both.

I wonder if Cliff Savage could be contacted anywhere.  My guess is that if the drawing does depict a side-to-side movement in front of the body, it's not something he spent any real amount of time actually using.  And as we've already covered, we could be misunderstanding the drawing.  The movement of a Figure 8 throw is certainly very difficult to show in a single image.  Heck, if it's the first time someone sees a person actually slinging with that style, it's hard to wrap your mind around what's happening.

Wouldn't that be hilarious though.  If we found Cliff somewhere and sent him an email.  "Dear Mr. Savage.  You wrote a book about slinging 40 years ago and I have a question about one of the images."  ;D

joe_meadmaker wrote on Apr 1^st, 2025 at 7:52pm:

My guess is that if the drawing does depict a side-to-side movement in front of the body, it's not something he spent any real amount of time actually using.

Ok, I don't know if this is an illustrator's mistake, but the description says about the movement with alternating rotation of the sling clockwise and counterclockwise. And by the way, this looks more like what the guy in the videos mentioned in the other thread demonstrates.  ;D


joe_meadmaker wrote on Apr 1^st, 2025 at 7:52pm:

Wouldn't that be hilarious though.  If we found Cliff somewhere and sent him an email.  "Dear Mr. Savage.  You wrote a book about slinging 40 years ago and I have a question about one of the images."

I think he would be pleased that his work, after so many years, is still interesting to other people's minds and causing controversy.  :)

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The picture from this book showing the proper way to hold the release cord doesn’t look like it would work very well?

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Pocket rock.et wrote on Apr 2^nd, 2025 at 12:00am:

the description says about the movement with alternating rotation of the sling clockwise and counterclockwise.

So it does...
I guess I should read more.  ;D
Yeah, you're right.  I've been trying to give Cliff the benefit of the doubt, but it wasn't meant to be.


@Mobiusslinger - No, that hold will work.  It's not very common though (at least in modern day slinging).  Back a couple years I used a very similar hold for a while.  But instead of the finger loop being on the middle finger, I wore it on the pinky.  The retention cord passed through the hand and the two cord were held next each other between the thumb and index finger (as shown in the image).  A hold like this does secure a projectile in the pouch very well because with the cords next to each other like that, the pouch is basically as closed as it can get.  The idea came from this topic, https://slinging.org/forum/YaBB.pl?num=1589886852, which is worth checking out.

Would this book still be available anywhere?

https://archive.org/details/the-sling-for-sport-survival-breakout-productions

Not new copies that I see anywhere.  Amazon has some used copies available: https://www.amazon.com/Sling-Sport-Survival-Cliff-Savage/dp/1893626172.  There's a few on ebay too, but those ones are really expensive.

There is a PDF of the full book attached to the first post of this thread.  Just want to mention in case you didn't see it.