At the height of the pandemic, many hobbies started to gain popularity, one of which was skateboarding. Skateboarding has easily become one of the most popular activities to do during the pandemic. When people first start skateboarding, they hope to someday become the next Tony Hawk, but that takes time. You can not just buy a skateboard and do a kickflip the next day.You have to learn basic tricks then work your way up. This list will provide easy tricks that can get you on your way to learn more advanced tricks.
The first trick is called a tic-tac, which consists of placing your dominant foot at the front of the board (not the very front but the upper deck) then your other foot is going to be placed at the tail of the skateboard. To start off the trick, you are going to push off and start skateboarding. Then start putting pressure on your foot that’s placed on the tail of your skateboard. The front wheels of your skateboard are going to come off the ground while your back wheels are going to be still on the ground. You don’t want the tail of your board to be on the ground- you want it to be hovering over the ground. Once your front wheels are in the air, you are going to start putting more pressure on your dominant foot (the foot at the top of the skateboard), and with that you will start to come down back onto the ground.
The next trick is called jumping on. For this trick you will put your board upside down and lay it over your feet. Your feet should be placed equivalent to each of the screws on the deck of the board. You are going to jump up. This will move the board so that it is now right side up. When you jump up, you are going to jump up making both feet land back on the base of the board.
The next trick is a nameless trick but it is one of the easiest. What you are going to do first is get your feet in a normal skateboarding position. Then you are going to pop the board. You should pop the board in when you move your back foot to the tail of the board and put all your weight on the back (the tail should be fully on the ground). Then you are going to move the foot that is at the top of the board so that it is no longer on the skateboard. Once you do that, the only thing you need to do is use your hand to grab the top of the board. You put all the steps together and you get a full trick.
The final trick is a shove it. You are going to take your back foot and place it at the tail of the skateboard. Rotate your foot so its diagonal on the tail. Your other foot should be played at the top of the skateboard parallel with your trucks. Your back foot is going to make a scooping motion so that the board can rotate 360o. Your front foot is going to make a slight jump and land back on the top of the board. Both feet should land back on the board if done correctly.
I asked a sophomore at San Mateo High School named Maya Dulnuan-Turner about some of the tricks she learned when she started skateboarding, “One of the first tricks I ever learned was the one where you put your feet unde the board, jump, flip the board and land on your feet, and a shove it, but I learned that much later.” I then asked her how long it took her to perfect this trick, she commented back saying,”For the trick I described earlier it took me two tries in order to perfect it, the shove it took me a month or so with constant practice”.
I then asked an ex skateboarder and current college freshman Kyle Ansaldo about how old he was when he started skateboarding.He replied, “I started at 14 because I was seeing a lot of skateboarding in my neighborhood and all over the internet.” When asked about some advice he had for people who are just starting out skateboarding, he replied with,“Skateboarding takes a lot of practice and dedication but once you land that first trick all of it will be worth it.”