Every contest has winners, losers, upsets, underdogs, surprises, victories, and defeats. But my favorite part of a yoyo contest doesn’t actually happen that often…it’s when someone gets on stage and does something that is so far off the norm that their placement becomes irrelevant. I’ve always personally been drawn to the more esoteric aspects of yoyo play. And while I love a good competition-crushing freestyle as much as the next guy, it’s the people who push boundaries that get me up out of my seat and reaching for a yoyo.

The 2013 European YoYo Championships was a mind-blowing event. I watched as much of the live stream as I could and there were so many fantastic performances….the winners very much deserved their titles and it’s almost a shame there weren’t more awards to give out. But one freestyle in particular had me jumping up and flipping out completely, and it was from a player I’ve only recently even heard about.

So, I’m officially giving my own personal Honorable Mention to Ethan Wong Wing Hang of C3YoYoDesign for his mind-blowing freestyle that was about 90% horizontal finger-spin tricks. It was absurdly bold and risky, and he nailed a lot of it. I have no idea if he really thought it would score high enough to get him the win, but he had to have known just how badly it could have gone…and he went for it anyway.

Absolutely amazing. Congrats to Ethan on becoming part of C3YoYoDesign, and on his new signature model, the MO-vitation. Check out his freestyle below!