61. Double Hook Turn. Giro de Son Doble. Cuban Salsa. Rueda de Casino.

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The Hook Turn, also called Giro de Son, is mostly used by the Lead. But a Follow could use Hook Turns in hands-free free styling. The Double Hook Turn, Giro de Son Doble, is for the better Leads, and we see double turns often in show dances, in social dance demos as well as in social dancing.

Despite the fact that the double hook turn is difficult, it is hard to come by good tutorials. I don't know of any. But if we analyse the many videos on YouTube, it is clear that most Leads use one of two techniques: The well-formed and optimised spinning around the left foot for both turns, or the mediocre, using the left foot for the first turn and the right foot for the second turn.

Textbook Double Hook Turn

The Textbook way to do a double hook turn, is to regard it as a spin turn or pirouette turn around one leg. It is mostly done as a traveling turn, as last part of Enchufla, and the Lead must change hands during the turn. The preparation is all important. The traveling double Hook Turn has three parts:

Preparation. On "1-2-3" of Enchufla, the Lead pivots around doing 180 degree of the first turn.

On "5-6" the Lead continues with the Hook Behind part, turning on the heel of the left foot.

On "6-7", slightly supported by the Lead's right foot, the Lead continues to turn but know on the ball of the left foot, and lands on the right foot on "7".

The right foot has no weight on it during the turn, and for that reason it can be used for positioning at the end of the turn on "7". Since the the right foot is free, it is easy to swing it around a little adding extra momentum to the end of the turn, making it easy to add 90 or 180 degree to the double turn if needed, resulting in a 2¼ turn or a 2½ turn. This gives us more options for how to continue after the Double Hook Turn.

Using both feet

If a Lead doesn't know the double spin technique around the left foot, the Lead most likely just go for it and ends up using both feet. The first turn around the left foot, the second turn around the right foot. When the Lead comes to the point where he lifts the left foot a little in order to transfer the weight from the heel to the ball of the foot, instead of turning on the ball for the last turn, he uses the ball of the left foot to kick-start the second turn around the right foot.

The two feet technique often works in the situation but it is inferior to spinning around one foot. Having weight on the right foot on "6-7'' makes it impossible to use it for positioning at the end of the turn. Instead step "1" becomes both a step of positioning and of starting the next figure and that will only work for a limited number of continuations.