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Skateboarding: The Basics and Essentials for All After skating for several years, I tended to try and turn it into a scientific method to understanding tricks. If I did not land the trick, I would refer back to these essential rules and determine what went wrong. Just like you would refer back to addition and subtraction rules with math, similarly I would refer back to these rules for skating. Just to clarify, I’m not promising PJ Ladd steez but something to help you learn. Now just like in old skool hip hop, let’s break it down: Rule #1: You ain’t landing shit without balance. Forget the “carpet” method because it is a completely different game when you start rolling. Though some of his movies were cheesy, Bruce Lee’s philosophy can be applied to skateboarding: Balanced is achieved in motion. Learning to roll around comfortably will ultimately lead to gnar dog tricks. Through out an entire trick, you should have balanced and comfortable (from standing to crouching). So, forget the 3 flips and just practice being comfortable on the board. Rule #2: After you can roll around like a figure skater on a skateboard, it is time to bust some tricks. All tricks stem from the Ollie. The more comfortable you become with the ollie, the better. The second most important aspect to skating is “A-pop”. “A” stands for Ankle pop. When you do tricks, the worst thing you can do is pop flat footed. This will make the trick more difficult and kill the height of the trick. Basically, you do not slam your entire foot down but just snap the ankle down for lift off. Just work on maintaining balance while lifting off and snapping that ankle down. Getting a crisp “A-pop” will lead to higher steezy tricks. Rule #3: After mastering the two rules above, now it is time for the fancy tricks. This last rule is primarily just for learning new flip tricks. I call it the “opposites attract” rule (Note: for this section, I will speak as if you are standing in regular stance). It works like this, if I wanted to do a kickflip, my right foot would be on the far side of the tail while the heel of my left foot would be entirely off and ready to flick out. Same with a heelflip but this time my popping foot would be on the other side of the tail. In other words, if I’m going to flick off the right side, my popping foot would be primarily on the left side of the tail. Putting them on opposite sides creates better leverage making the trick flip better ( Don’t forget “A-pop” either). Rule #4: Lastly, one must learn how to stop the rotation of the board. Obviously, this only applies to flip and shuv-it type tricks Depending on what trick you do, different feet will stop the rotation of the board. If your board flips, you are going to catch it with your popping foot to stop the flip (f/s flip, b/s heel, nollie flip, etc.) If you are doing a shuv-it trick, your front foot or non- popping foot will stop the rotation of the board (front shuv-it, varial flip, 360 kickflip, etc). Follow this rule if you want to be proper!!! These are the 4 commandments for skateboarding in my perspective. If you are having troubles with any tricks, refer back to these rules and it should help. And if you aren’t gifted like P-Rod, practice is the only thing that will make you a better skater.
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