Korean Plank

The teeterboard or Korean plank is an acrobatic apparatus that resembles a playground

seesaw A seesaw (also sometimes known as a teeter-totter in North America) is a long, narrow board supported by a single pivot point, most commonly located at the midpoint between both ends; as one end goes up, the other goes down. These are most comm ...

. The strongest teeterboards are made of oak (usually 9 feet in length). The board is divided in the middle by a

fulcrum A fulcrum (: fulcra or fulcrums) is the support about which a lever pivots. Fulcrum may also refer to: Companies and organizations * Fulcrum (Anglican think tank), a Church of England think tank * Fulcrum Press, a British publisher of poetry * Fu ...

made of welded steel. At each end of the board is a square padded area, where a performer stands on an incline before being catapulted into the air. The well-trained flyer performs various aerial

somersault A somersault (also ''flip'', ''heli'', and in gymnastics ''salto'') is an acrobatics, acrobatic exercise in which a person's body Rotation#Sports, rotates 360° around a horizontal axis with the feet passing over the Human head, head. A somersau ...

s, landing on padded mats, a human pyramid, a specialized landing chair, stilts, or even a

Russian bar The Russian bar (or Russian barre) is a circus act which combines the gymnastic skills of the balance beam, the rebound tempo skills of trampoline, and the swing handstand skills of the uneven bars and the parallel bars. The bar itself is a flexi ...

. The teeterboard is operated by a team of flyers, catchers, spotters and pushers. Some members of the team perform more than one acrobatic role. In the early 1960s the finest teeterboard acts, trained in the

Eastern Bloc The Eastern Bloc, also known as the Communist Bloc (Combloc), the Socialist Bloc, the Workers Bloc, and the Soviet Bloc, was an unofficial coalition of communist states of Central and Eastern Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America that were a ...

countries, performed with

Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus The Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, also known as the Ringling Bros. Circus, Ringling Bros., the Barnum & Bailey Circus, Barnum & Bailey, or simply Ringling, is an American traveling circus company billed as The Greatest Show on Earth ...

. Korean-style teeterboard called

Neolttwigi or () is a Traditional games of Korea, traditional game of Korea typically played by women and girls on traditional holidays such as Korean New Year, Chuseok, and Dano (Korean festival), Dano. is similar to seesaw, except that participants ...

is a form of teeterboard where two performers jump vertically in place, landing back on the apparatus instead of dismounting onto a landing mat or human pyramid. Korean plank acts are featured in the Cirque du Soleil shows ''

Nouvelle Experience Nouvelle is a French word, the feminine form of "new". It may refer to: ;Places * Nouvelle, Quebec, a municipality in Quebec, Canada * Nouvelle-Église, a commune in the Pas-de-Calais department, France * Port-la-Nouvelle, a commune in the Aude depa ...

'', '' Mystère'', ''

Dralion ''Dralion'' (pronounced Drah-lee-on) was a touring production by the Canadian entertainment company Cirque du Soleil. The show combined elements of traditional Chinese variety art, Chinese circus with Western contemporary circus, complementing th ...

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Corteo Corteo is a Cirque du Soleil touring production that premiered in Montreal, Quebec, Canada on April 21, 2005. As of May 24, 2005, Cirque du Soleil had broken its record of spectators for the première location in Montreal; more than 200,000 p ...

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Koozå ''Koozå'' is a touring circus production by Cirque du Soleil which premiered in Montréal, Quebec, Canada, in 2007. The show was written and directed by David Shiner, who had previously worked as a clown in Cirque du Soleil's production of '' N ...

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Amaluna ''Amaluna'' was a touring show by Cirque du Soleil. It was created and directed by Diane Paulus and is loosely inspired by ''The Tempest'' by William Shakespeare. It opened in Montréal Montreal is the List of towns in Quebec, largest cit ...

'', and ECHO.

Flying Fruit Fly Circus The Flying Fruit Fly Circus is Australia's national youth circus, and the only full-time circus school for young people in Australia. History The Flying Fruit Fly Circus was one of the productions of the Murray River Performing Group, initially ...

, based in

Albury Albury (; ) is a major regional city that is located in the Murray River, Murray region of New South Wales, Australia. It is part of the twin city of Albury–Wodonga, Albury-Wodonga and is located on the Hume Highway and the northern side of ...

NSW Australia, uses custom teeterboards (handmade in-house) in numerous national and international shows. The Hungarian board (''bascule hongroise'') has a higher fulcrum, and the pushers jump from a height (e.g., from a tower). References:
Technical Note 6-7: Teeterboard

FEDEC Manual on Teeterboard

A kinematic analysis of jumping technique in elite Korean teeterboard athletes: a case-study
DOI:10.1080/14763141.2021.2018030
The Influence of the Board Bending and Recoil Effect on Circus Performance in Korean Teeterboard
DOI:10.4028/p-7QwXVo
Effect of jump heights, landing techniques, and participants on vertical ground reaction force and loading rate during landing on three different Korean teeterboards
DOI:10.1177/17543371211058031 {{Circus skills Circus equipment Circus skills