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Blur
The Blur is an intermediate-to-advanced freestyle footbag trick, valued at 3 ADD (Additional Degrees of Difficulty). It is the “blurry” variant of the Mirage — in notation terms, a Mirage whose set carries an extra dexterity — and is one of the core moves that introduces players to set-dexterity tricks 1).
| Blur | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Type | Set-dexterity delay trick |
| Difficulty | 3 ADD |
| Set family | Blurry (spinning/stepping clipper-set family) |
| Base move | Mirage (2 ADD) |
| Contact (delay) | Opposite-foot toe delay |
Description
A Blur begins from a clipper position. Rather than simply setting the bag upward as in a plain Mirage, the player performs a dexterity with the setting leg during the set itself — the leg circles the footbag as the bag rises — before the second, opposite leg sweeps over the bag (the Mirage dexterity) and the bag is caught on the opposite toe.
In short, where a Mirage is set → one dexterity → delay, the Blur is set (with its own built-in dexterity) → one dexterity → delay. That extra dexterity packed into the “uptime” of the set is what makes it a distinct move with its own name, and is what raises its value by one add over the plain Mirage 2).
The name reflects the look of the move: the rapid leg motion during the set makes the action appear to “blur” together before the catch.
Categorical Placement
The Blur sits at the 3-ADD tier of freestyle footbag, the level at which most players transition out of pure beginner tricks and into competitive shredding. Difficulty in footbag is measured by the ADD system, where each set, dexterity, and delay contributes add value 3).
Within that tier, the Blur belongs to the “blurry” set family — notated with an added dexterity on the clipper set. This family is closely related to several sister set-types that all add a dexterity to the set in slightly different ways, including the Stepping, Whirling, and Blazing sets. Each of these turns a 2-add base move into a 3-add move by the same mechanism: an extra dexterity hidden in the set.
Because the modifier attaches to the set, it applies across an entire group of base moves. The plain 2-add moves each have a blurry 3-add counterpart:
- Mirage → Blur (Blurry Mirage)
- Clipper → Blurry Clipper
- Legover → Blurry Legover
- Guay → Blurry Guay
- Pickup → Blurry Pickup
- Reverse Guay → Blurry Reverse Guay
The Blur is also a frequent building block in higher-add combinations and big-trick attempts, where it is chained into spinning moves such as the Blurry Whirl 5).
Similar Tricks
- Mirage — the 2-ADD parent move; the Blur is its blurry version.
- Smear (Pixie Mirage) — a different 3-add set producing the same delay; explicitly cited in the rules as the same difficulty as the Blur but a different set, making the two close cousins rather than the same move.
- Whirl / Whirling Mirage — sister set-family move built on a spinning clipper set.
- Stepping Mirage and Blazing Legover — other members of the same “extra-dexterity-in-the-set” group at the 3-add tier.
- Blurry Legover, Blurry Guay, Blurry Pickup — the rest of the blurry family, sharing the Blur's set but ending in different dexterities and delays.