Hardest Trick I Can Teach

Alright lets jump right into one of the more advanced tricks I can successfully teach. The Tre Flip or the 3 flip. The actual name of the trick is a 360 flip. You need to first learn 360 pop shove its. Actually you don't really need to learn them. I skipped that trick and still learned it and now I'm trying to learn the 360 pop shove it. You also need to learn a kick flip. Obviously.

For this trick it's really hard. I'll tell you now you won't be able to learn it in a day. It took me about a whole summer to learn them and I can only do them sometimes. Alright here's what you do.

You get into kick flip position. The only difference is that you might want to pull it down a little bit more to about the middle of the board. You need to also move your back foot a little bit more forward so the front of your back foot is in the pocket on the opposite side of the board.

The real way to land this trick is that you need to scoop more then pop. You need to do a little bit of both, but you really need to work on the scoop. The scoop is what makes the trick. Another thing you need to do is lightly flick your foot to make it do the flip part while it is still doing the 360 part of it.

Really common errors. I used to do this I would just scoop and not pop. You need to give it a little pop to make it actually work. It you don't pop it will fly out from under your feet. Then if you do land it you will have to jump for it which makes it a little less clean.

This is all I'll be able to teach you. Thanks for learning with me!

Grinding

If you're either 1.) Getting sick of trying to learn flat land tricks or 2.) Ready to learn new tricks, then lets learn some grinds.

The easiest grind to learn is a board slide usually back side. I have yet to learn front side board slides. I don't believe that people could get too hurt trying this trick at first. If you're trying is on either a ledge or a little rail you should be fine and not have to worry about getting hurt. The only thing I could think of you getting hurt is if you fall back while in the middle of a grind. I did that once, I was on an about 5 foot rail and I was about 5 foot at the time. I was in the middle of my grind and I fell back and hit my head and my tail bone. It was really bad so be careful.

If you are thinking about learning this trick then you need to do one thing. Commit. You also have to ollie and do like a 90 degree spin. Other then that I mean you need to just commit. If you're scared to do this trick then you just have to close your eyes and say "What would Jake Woj do?"

You need to ride a little bit to the rail and then you need to pop the board and do a 90 degree turn. Then you get it and start to do the board slide. That's when you spin off. You can either finish the 180 and ride away switch or you could turn back the way you started so regular or goofy. If you don't know how to turn out just land sideways. That's really all you need to do to land this trick.

That's about all I can really help you with for a board slide. If you want to try a 50-50 then this is almost as easy. All you do is pop an ollie and move your feet over and get on the rail and start grinding and then ride off the rail. That's it so go out and land it!

Bigger Tricks

If you have learned how to pop shove it, ollie, and 180 it's time for you to learn a new trick that will either make you or break you. The kick flip. This is one of the harder tricks to learn as a beginner. It's also one of the hardest tricks to teach because everyone does it differently. I spent a decent amount of time to learn this trick it took me probably half the summer. This trick is something you cannot teach yourself. You need someone to help you for foot positions and everything.

Alright let’s get right into this trick. If you are serious about trying to learn it then you have to practice. Today you need to grab your board and try it. Kick it a few times so you have a little bit of speed like only moving for a little bit. The you put your feet back in ollie position. You take your front foot and slide it back a little bit so your heel is hanging off, so you have your back foot in the ollie position and you need to put your front foot a little bit off the board and pop as hard as you can. After you pop it flick your foot off your board where your board is towards the left. Then jump. The board will slowly flip around doing a kick flip. Then all you have to do is slam your feet down and roll away.

Some common errors are: turning your body when you flick your foot off which will cause you to be nowhere near landing right, and you could land sideways. Another error is not landing it. If you're scared to land it you have something called scared foot. or "P foot" for short. The only way to land this is if you pull your front foot in and not be scared. That's the only way you can land this trick.

A Warning

I probably should have put the warning in the first blog, but oh well. A big warning for anyone who skates at the skate parks. Be careful. If you skate vert on big quarter pipes make sure you don't get over confident. Know your limit. If you're skating street don't try to ollie a 6 set after a month of skating. Skating takes time and practice. You can do big quarter pipes and go down stairs just wait until you're ready to do it and you know how bad it hurts to fall.

If you're also trying to learn flat land tricks like kick flips, varial flips, pop shove it's and etc be prepared to get hit in the shin a few times, and the worst thing you have to be prepared for that happens frequently is getting hit in your ankle. Right on the ball that sticks out. That hurts so bad! Another really bad injury that happens a lot in the skating world is when you roll your ankle and your foot bends sideways and touches your leg. Then you have to ice and it’s just a really bad thing.

The two things all skaters fear are credit cards and popsicles. Those are both where you are skating usually off of something and the board goes straight up wards and you land on it either in the tail bone or... You catch my drift. Those are the two worst things ever. The pain is unreal and you just have no idea what to do, so if you're going to start skating be prepared to experience all of these. Skating might seem like all fun and games, but it's also a lot of injuries and sitting on the couch with your ankle covered with an ice pack. I Be careful out there!

If you're still willing to try and skate after learning all the possibilities of pain then good luck! Keep looking at my blog for helpful tips!

Next step

After you learn your ollie and you want to try and learn some harder tricks go for either pop shove it's or 180's. Those two tricks are basic and easy to learn. Fun fact I can do kick flips and varial flips, but I can't always do a pop shove it, so my advice is to learn them earlier. 

We are going to start out learning 180's. A 180 is an ollie but you turn your body 180 degrees. It's half of a circle. These aren't that hard at all. It sounds like a hard trick, but it's really not that hard there are only like 3 steps you need to follow. First you need to get ollies down for sure. After you're perfect with your ollies just put your back foot on the tail of your board and push down so you're in a manual (balanced on only two wheels) and spin around. Depending on which way you spin it'll be either a front side (FS) or backside (BS) 180. You only have to give it a little ollie. You start to turn before you ever pop the board to do an ollie. Then while you are popping start to turn even more in the direction you want to do it. Then you'll land it switch or in fakie. Either way you land it might be hard for you to roll away if you can't ride switch.

For pop shove it's, they're really easy and I can barely do them. The first thing you want to do it ride your board. Then you put your front foot under the bolts and have your foot at an angle like this / if you're regular and \ if you're goofy. The only thing you have to do is pop the board and scoop your back foot back. Then with your front foot just pick it up off the board so it can spin then slam the board down. That's all it is. It's honestly easier then an ollie.

Getting A Little More Advanced

After you learn the basics and how to ride on your board and everything along those lines you're going to want to start learning tricks. The first trick you should learn after you start skating is an ollie. An ollie is when you are riding your skateboard and you get into the air. It's like jumping but you use the skateboard. If you're a biker it's called a bunny hop. So with this trick it's really the way to start learning to skate. Once you learn an ollie you can start learning more tricks.

With this trick you really have to make sure you can ride your board first. I've seen many people try to do an ollie before they can even ride their board down a hill. You need to learn how to ride it and have control. If you have been trying to do this trick and can't do it there are a few common errors to look at!

When you're trying to learn this trick, don't learn it stationary make sure you learn it while skating. It's harder stationary then while moving. Another common error is foot placement. You need to put your front foot in the middle of the board where you have the most control. Then your back foot you want on the tail of your board. Then all you have to do is pop it and slide your foot up and jump. I call it the "Pop-Slide-Hop." That's how I learned how to do an ollie.

If you're still struggling with this trick look on Youtube for videos that can help you. The visuals will also help a lot. There really isn't a wrong way to do this trick. A lot of people do it different it all depends how you feel comfortable. When I do ollies I put my foot in the pocket of the board. (The part where it looks like a bowl.)

The Basics

Everyone that wants to start skateboarding starts at the same point. The very first thing you need to do is get a skateboard. If you're a youngster around the age of 10 I would say a Walmart board would be good for you. If you're that young you probably won't learn all that fast, but if you're a teenager or even older I would recommend going out to your local shop and getting a skateboard from there. If you're not too serious about it, or if you're not planning to get good fast then I would recommend you get an ATM board or a Goodwood board or even a cheap 20 dollar shop board. Then for the rest of the board I would recommend you get the cheapest package they have which will still be about 100 dollars, but that includes two trucks, wheels, hardware, grip tape, and bearings. It's actually a good deal because Trucks usually run around 40 all together, grip tape is about 10, bearings very, and same with wheels. For your first board get an ATM board with Thunder trucks, Lucky bearings, MOB grip tape, Shorty's hardware, and just generic wheels. That's an ideal set up for someone who is just learning to skate.

For people who are decent at skating and can do a few tricks you probably know what you like to ride. My preferred company of skateboards would have to be Girl, Plan B, Chocolate, Santa Cruz and Baker. The only boards I like from Baker are Andrew Reynold's. You can also check out Dozer Skateboards, Which is the company I ride for.

For the rest of the board I would recommend Royal Trucks, Spitfire wheels or Gold Wheels, Bones bearings or Fkd bearings. Those are all what I ride and they are pretty good, but everyone has something they like I’m just suggesting what I ride.