Endurance refers to running a pattern for a long time. The world record for the longest endurance run of any juggling pattern is 13 hours, 10 minutes, and 5 seconds of 3 balls by David Rush.
Endurance contests[]
In an endurance competition, the goal is to keep juggling longer than anyone else. Normally everyone starts juggling at the same time and gets only one attempt, and the last person left juggling wins. 5 ball endurance contests are common at juggling conventions because this is a low enough number that plenty of people can participate, and a high enough number that it doesn't last for hours. Sometimes if the contest goes on for an extended amount of time, competitors might be asked to do tricks such as sitting down, standing on one leg, juggling different patterns, siteswaps, pirouettes, etc. until one person remains.
Numbers endurance competitions[]
The usual endurance contest format doesn't work as well for very high numbers of objects because the runs don't last very long, so it would be much harder to tell who lasted the longest. The IJA and the WJF hold endurance competitions for numbers juggling using a different format where only one person juggles at a time, and each participant is allowed either a certain number of tries or a certain amount of time to try to do a good run with a given number of props. The judges count how many catches each person does, and compare each competitor's best attempt. Only catches made before the time when the first dropped object should have been caught are counted. After qualifying a number, a competitor may choose to try to qualify the next higher number. The winner of a numbers endurance competition is the person who gets the most catches with the highest number qualified. There are separate numbers endurance competitions for balls, rings, clubs, and bounce juggling. Up to 9 balls, 10 rings, 7 clubs, and 10 bouncing balls have been qualified in these competitions.
Austin JuggleFest 2008 - 5 Ball Endurance
5 ball endurance at Austin JuggleFest 2008
7 Ball Endurance at IJA 2010
7 ball endurance at IJA 2010
WJF 6 ENDURANCE COMPETITIONS
Numbers Endurance and Isolated Endurance competitions at WJF 6
Other endurance contest variations[]
- Isolated endurance: The jugglers stand on chairs so that they can only juggle for as long as they can maintain enough control over the pattern to keep it going without moving their feet.
- Concentration: One person juggles at a time, while people try to distract them by throwing balls at their head.
- Combat: Each participant tries to make their opponents drop while maintaining their own pattern.
- Blind juggling: Everyone juggles with their eyes closed, and the last one still juggling wins.
- Huggling: two jugglers embrace and they each juggle 3 balls with their arms wrapped around their partner.
- Simon says: Everyone except "Simon" starts juggling at the same time and attempts the tricks that Simon says to do. Anyone who drops, fails to do a trick Simon says to do, or does a trick when "Simon" didn't say "Simon says" is eliminated from the game.
- Aside from toss juggling, other props and circus skills can have endurance, too: club balance on nose/face, devilstick propeller, numbers diabolos, longest yo-yo sleeper, handstands, and more.