Rogue Hoover Medicine Balls

Rogue Hoover Balls

Rogue Hoover Balls are smaller 10” diameter versions of our standard 4LB and 6LB Medicine Balls, and make great options for kids or newcomers to medball training. These balls also meet the competition size standard for the game of Hooverball itself—an old-school hybrid of volleyball, tennis, and medicine ball training that’s been called “more strenuous than either boxing, wrestling or football” and effective at targeting “nearly every muscle in the body.”*

Featuring a precision nylon thread seam construction with a moisture and scuff-resistant coated-vinyl shell, Rogue Hoover Balls are extremely durable and among the few modern medicine balls entirely constructed in the USA. The interior filling is substantial enough to help the ball keep its shape across repeated use, but also forgiving and flexible enough for athletes to safely stop or catch the ball at high velocity. The vinyl shell is gray (distinguishing these from the standard black Rogue Medballs) and includes exclusive Rogue branding in white.

A Little Background on the Sport of “Hooverball” 

Named for the 31st President of the United States, “Hooverball” was created at the White House during Herbert Hoover’s first year in office (1929) as part of a unique daily fitness regime for the president and his staff. The game (invented by Hoover’s personal physician Joel T. Boone) is played by teams of 2-4 players on a volleyball-like court with an 8′ high net and a 6LB medicine ball. Scoring is handled exactly like tennis, and the gameplay is similar. The server throws the ball, and the opponent(s) must catch it on the fly and immediately return it, attempting to put it where it cannot be reached and returned. The side that misses the ball or throws it out of bounds loses the point.

“It required less skill than tennis, was faster and more vigorous, and therefore gave more exercise in a short time,” Hoover wrote in his Memoirs.

Hooverball still has a cult following, and an annual Championship tournament is held each year in West Branch, Iowa, home of the Herbert Hoover Presidential Library.

*Quote by Will Irwin, a friend of President Hoover, in Physical Culture magazine, 1931.