Andrew's Skating Lessons

This page will be complete with brand new pics soon! For now, just enjoy Andrew's lessons in text only.

50/50 Grind

To do a 50/50 you must first learn the ollie. The 50/50 grind is your basic grind. Find a ledge and wax it. Get a fair amount of speed and line up so you are riding parallel to the ledge. Ollie and aim your board so that both trucks land on the ledge. Don't ollie too high or you will stick when you land. Keep your balance so that the board doesn't roll out from under you. When you start to lose speed or you want to finish the trick you can either ollie off or drop off. To drop off just lift your front truck and turn it to the side. Keep the board level in the air and when you land, absorb the landing with your knees (not your ankles).

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Rail Slide, aka Board Slide

To do a railslide you must first learn the ollie.  The rail slide is the basic slide.  Find a rail (ledges don't work very well for this trick) and make sure its at a level that you are able to ollie onto.  Get a little speed.  Slow at first until you get the trick down.  Ride parallel to the rail.  Ollie and turn in the air so the board is diagonal with the rail.  When you land on the rail, lean back slightly and bend your knees to help balance yourself.  Don't lean too far back or you will fall back and break your head open.  That's always good.  Don't lean too far forward either.  Then you could bust your nuts nice and good.  When you get to the end of the rail, turn the board back so that your board is parallel with the rail again and roll away looking cool.  Kinda like me.  Almost!  You will find out that it takes a little work to get this trick down, but it is a fun trick.

Nose Slide

To do a nose slide you actually dont need to know how to do an ollie. You just need to have pretty good balance and a waxed ledge. Get a fair amount of speed and put your back foot on the tail and your front foot on the nose. Ride parallel to the ledge about a boards length away. You can either ollie and turn 90 degrees and land on your nose or you can just do a fast 90 degree turn while going and land your nose on the ledge. After landing your nose on the ledge take all your weight off your back foot and transfer it to the front foot. Lean slightly back but keep your knees bent for balance. When you start to slow down or you want to end the trick turn the board back 90 degrees so it is parallel with the ledge. Absorb the impact and roll away. Another trick that takes some time to perfect.

Manual / Nose Manual

A manual is a fancy name for a wheelie. Very fun trick that you can do wherever and whenever. But your back foot on the tail and your front foot on the front bolts or wherever it feels most comfortable. Get a little speed and put your arms out for balance. Lift up the front of the board by transferring more of your weight to your back foot. When you feel it lift, try to keep the front wheels from touching the ground by balancing your weight back and forth on the back wheel. Don't let the tail touch the ground like in this picture. When you want to stop the manual just put your weight back evenly. Ollie to manuals look really sweet.

After you get down the manual, you should be able to do a nose manual with no problem.  All you have to do is shift your weight on the board so that you're balanced leaning forward. The only problem with nose manuals is if you bring your nose down too far and it touches the ground you go flying forward. Work with the manual and nose manual and they can become a great trick to have on your trick list. 

Ollie

Well, an ollie is the trick that all beginners need to learn.  You can't do any of the other tricks I am going to teach you unless you get pretty good at the ollie.  Ollies take a while to get down but if you master them it makes all the other tricks easier.  An ollie looks like you are jumping and the board is sticking to your feet.  This is how I have heard many people explain them to me that don't know how to skate.  Actually, it is a lot more than that.  It is a mixture of friction and balance.  First, you should start off trying to learn the ollie without rolling.  Set your feet with your back foot on the tail and your front foot just behind the front bolts.  You have to bend your knees and throw your weight to your back foot for a fraction of a second until the tail hits the ground (when you get it down it makes a really cool *POP*).  After the tail hits the ground, you immediatly have to jump off of that foot and slide your front foot forward to the nose.  This may seem a little ackward at first but you will get it with a lot of practice.  Now try and put your feet over the bolts for the short time that you are in the air and land with your front and back wheels hitting the ground evenly.  Absorb the landing with your knees.  I can't stress this on you people enough.  Your knees are very sore by the end of the day, but it's better than permanent back damage or ankle sprains.  Now you have to try it while you are rolling.  Same concept except you have to make sure that you land with your weight evenly balanced or you fall on your ass.  Good luck and don't give up, because about the time you give up is about the time you will start to get it.

180° Ollie

After you get the ollie down you should probably start practicing the 180° ollie.  The 180° ollie is pretty cool trick.  It consists of ollieing and doing a 180° while you are in the air.  So, you have to have a pretty high ollie going if you want this whole 180° thing to happen.  If you land 90° you could fall pretty hard.  You probably want to practice going fakie (backwards) too.  Before the ollie you want to twist your upper torso the opposite way that you are going to turn the 180°.  Just before you ollie, quickly untwist yourself and turn 180°.  Try to keep the board under your feet by pressing down slightly to keep the friction.  Absorb the landing with your knees.  Now your riding fakie.  If you didn't practice riding fakie then you are probably on your butt.  YES!

Pop Shuv-It

A shuv-it is a cool trick if you work at it long enough to get it pretty high and land properly. What you want to do for this trick is set your feet with your back foot on the tail and you probably want to stick your big toe off the side of the tail so you can get a little scoop action going on. Well, what's going to happen in this trick is you are going to ollie and at the same time scoop the board around 180 and catch it with your feet (preferably not your shins) and land all cool like. Well, start going, set your feet up like I told you to. Just as you pop your tail down you want to kick your back foot towards your back and your front foot towards your front. You want to hover above the board with your feet back in normal position except your waiting for the board. So you are riding on air for a bit here. Watch the board. Just as it gets lined back up with your feet catch it with one or both feet. WARNING! DO NOT LET THE BOARD NAIL YOU IN THE SHINS. HURTS LIKE HELL!!!!!! Yeah, I learned from personal experience. You can prevent this by not being a little pussy poser and bailing. Ok? Well, back to the point. After you catch it you want to land and absorb with your knees. Look cool.

Kickflip

Kickflip. Everyone wants to learn how to do the kickflip. Everyone knows about the kickflip. Everyone wants to see the kickflip. I flip, you flip, we all flip for kickflip. Yeah, kickflips are evil. It's a trick that took me forever to learn. I kept bailing. Not on purpose. It would just happen. It took me about a year to learn kickflips. Actually, what am I talking about, I relearn them everyday. I know a lot of you have the same problem but I don't know what to tell you. Just keep trying. One day you will just land on the board without expecting it and you won't believe it. Then it will just be practice until you get it down. You want to set up your front foot at a 35 degree angle to the edge of your board with your heel hanging off and your back foot on the the tail. Pop like an ollie. Just as you start to go airborn kick your foot straight out and then off to the side. Hover above the board and get ready to catch the board after it does a complete flip. Catch and land as usual. There is always the chance you will land primo. Primo is bad. Could lead to some messed up ankles, broken wrists, broken bones, ect....... thats why it is important that you wear all the safety gear that I dont wear ;) You will not be any cooler if you can land this trick. (Well, yes you will.) Take it a step at time. Don't try and learn kickflips right after you learn ollies. 

Varial Flip

Dun nun nun nun!!! It's the varial flip. I love it. This trick is so cool. I couldn't do 360 flips so I learned this.

...Coming soon!

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