How Skateboarding Works

this It really does put out a tremendous amount of heat. Yeah, Josh's we have a lamp on our table that we used to see. Well we can't see any longer. Oh well blin'd blind. Yeah, that did make it like three cooler immediately. Yeah, it's that lamp. It's the lamp. And then like you know, just people generating heating here. Yeah, podcasters were a ball me bunch, the blusters, a herd of oxen in the corner. And it doesn't help. It's been the best intro ever I think. Do you think that?

I think so you're not being facetious. No, you know the word facetious. What do you got for me? Well, when I was younger, I knew the word facetious. It was a word that my dad used a lot, so I used it in like regular conversation correct yeah, okay, but I've never seen it written out, or so I thought. And then finally one day I ran across in a book again this word I kept coming up on, and I was like, what is that word fastidious? Facidious, facious?

And I was like, that's facetious. I don't know that I've seen it spelled either. Yeah, it looks like factious, you know, it looks like facet like a facet of a jewel or something. And then E s I O U S. Yeah, there's no I would have so bombed the spelling of that, right. But the thing is, it's like I was using it correctly in conversation, and I had seen it in books. I just never put the two together until finally one day it clicked and you had to get your tattoo changed. Facetious across the back

of your neck in the heart, all right. So um skateboarding. Yeah, about the same time that I realized the word facetious when it was correctly spelled, as I was skateboarding at the time. So that's how it ties in that was a little skateboarder for a long time. Yeah, I was too. I Um, I did not. I'm not old enough to where I saw all the different waves of skateboarding. Of the four, but the first two I saw, I didn't see the first one. That's pretty funny. That would mean

I'm dead now. There's plenty of old boarders out there, sure, yeah, but I was of the age where I definitely had the um small sort of plastic board with the single little tail on the back only and clay wheels. No, no, yeah, clay wheels. It seems to me like that the skateboards from from biblical times. Clay wheels. That's what I think of when I see clay wheels. What do they even

look like? Uh? Just brown? Were they super dangerous? Well? Yeah, And if you've seen the great documentary um Dogtown and z Boys they go over. It's a really good doc by the way, like amazing footage that they have and good music and highly recommended over the movie version. The Lords of Dogtown was Val Kilmer in that, No, Heath Ledger was. He played the the mentor. I can't remember his name. Skip the Zephyr Crew, yes, skip skip Skip went on to found Santa Monic Airline Skateboards. Yeah, yeah,

he was. He stayed on. It's like a big influence in skateboarding's good. So anyway, I just wanted to point out that I have branched a few different Like I started with a little clay one, and then in high school is when I got the big, huge fat skateboard when they were super obnoxious. Yeah, let's see, that's when I came into skating. Four had like a nice Lance Mountain. Um,

it was my first board. My first board, remember the Nash tough tops there was it was blank on the bottom, there were no graphics, but on the top cut out in the grip tape was like a star that looked kind of like a saw blade circular saw blade. And then the big difference was the different colors of the board underneath blue or pink or yellow or what it was like neon green. Yeah, you're a big fat one.

Yeah and looking back like kind of corny. And I think after that is when like true skater started being like, you know, we don't really care that much about like awesome graphics, Like we just want a good board, good board. You wanted some rib bones, on the side. You remember those underneath. Yeah, yeah, but I don't think people like those now either. Oh no, not anymore skaters. No, that that the whole point of those. I think it was, you know, to let you rail slide or whatever easier.

But I think it was also to protect those graphics too. They told he was because I had a little big plastic bumper under the tailpiece too, which is counterintuitive to the tricks. Yeah, but I mean, like, who cares about protecting the tail It's weird. Yeah. I was also a nosebone too. That was not never very good. Oh I wasn't either. I don't mean to give that. I mean I spent a lot of our skating and I never got very good. I think I pulled off one kick

flip once, really once. That's good. I thought it was pretty good too. That is the trick that you most often see kids not landing driving down the street. If you ever see a kid like I, rarely see a successful kickflip just on the sidewalk. Oh yeah. If you see somebody who pulls off a kick flip, the chances are there somebody filming them because they know that they're going to be able to pull off the kickflip in l A. Actually I would see more, you know, obviously

better skaters out there in New York. Yeah, all right, skateboarding. Should we get going with a little history. Yeah, let's talk about the history of this. This this is so close to my heart. Man, I fell down the rabbit hole to day watching like old skate videos and like checking out old Powell Peralta boards. That was my dam

was Powell. Well, we mentioned that there have been four distinct waves of skateboarding starting in UH ninety nine, and each new wave like it's it's just waned in popularity here and there and then come back strong or in stronger due to either UH advances mainly in like skateboard technology right and trickery, yes, and um parental acceptance. Because

it never really goes away. Skateboarding is either ever since its inception, it's either been mainstream or else forced underground and like practiced by juvenile delinquents who kind of kept it going and advanced it quietly until it came back into the mainstream and parents were like, Okay, you guys can skate again. But the true origin of the skateboard, the first one that came out, the first commercial produced when it was in nineteen fifty nine. It's called the

roller derbry skate. Yeah. And before that, you know, if you've seen the movie Back to the Future when Martin might Fly rips the little milk crate off the front of the homemade wooden scooter, that was where skateboards really came from. You just you know, it was a sort of a homemade deal with like a peach crate as

the front of your scooter, a couple of handles. Yes, steal wheels from roller skates, yeah, and that was super dangerous, right, But like you say, if you take the peach crate off and take the handles off, you have that two by four with the roller skate wheels. And they don't know exactly who did it. They think actually several people probably did it simultaneously Marty right in the forties. They

think surfers in California did it. There are kids in France that were seen doing it in the forties, so it kind of spread. It happened, it arose independently around the world at about the same time. That's called the zeitgeist. That is my friend. So now we're in the nineties, early nineteen sixties and it was I mean it really took off like a rocket in the first few years of the nineteen sixties. Like fifty million skateboards were sold in those first three years and it was everywhere. Yeah,

it was like the hot new craze. Well it was like also like hula hoops and things like that, Like it was America was in a crazy mood, a craze mood, like whatever the big thing was, Yeah, and skateboard fell into that big time. The problem is, uh, they were pretty dangerous. There wasn't a lot you could do with them now they because again there's steel wheels there. It's basically two by four on steel wheels, ride down the

street and you could fall off of it exactly. That was so and I think because of the safety concerns overnight skateboarding just went away in like nineteen sixty five. It was over, but it's still kind of stayed somewhat popular as a thing to do among surfers. When the waves weren't breaking, Um, they would just kind of sidewalk surface what they called it, And they never really saw

it as anything bigger than a supplement to surfing. It was just kind of like it wasn't its own thing until uh the sixties, the late sixties or the early seventies, when clay wheels came about. You could do a little more stuff. I think, Well, clay was better than the steel wheels, but still bad. And that's hit a rock in the road your toast, and like that's when people started dying from skateboards, which kind of led to its

decline again. Sure, and then some surfers, the Zephyr Crew are the ones who like broke skateboarding out once and for all. Well, yeah, thanks to uh Frank Nasworthy's invention of the Eurothane wheel in nineteen seventy two. Uh he founded Cadillac Wheels, and all of a sudden, it was like a smooth, like steady, silent experience on a skateboard for the first time. And then you changed everything it did because it could grip. Um, it wasn't just that it was it rumbly any longer like that. You're a

thing could grip like concrete or pavement. Yeah, instead of just stopping and um, yeah, all of a sudden, there were way more surfaces that could be skated. And that plus the invention of the truck, yeah, which is basically an axle for your wheels that not only allows the wheels to revolve more smoothly, especially when you add a set of bearings, but it also allows you to maneuver to the left or the right, which is a big deal. Kind of opens things up there, twisty. And then the

kicktail also changed everything. All these kind of came together at about the same time. Yeah, and you mentioned the Zephyr Crew in ve that held the first um uh basically competition in Delmark, California, and that's when and if

you've seen the documentary, it's pretty great. I mean they had sort of the holdovers from the sixties doing like handstands and all these sort of square, antiquated moves, and then these little punks came in there and just like toward the place up and like the judges didn't know how to judge them at the time because they've never seen anything like it. Yeah, it's pretty cool. It was

a pool. They were skating in pools right well at least, Yeah, the pool thing came a little later because they um there was a big drought in the mid seventies in southern California and water was actually in short supply. So people would drain their pools or not refill them or whatever for the new summer. And so they started busting in the backyards and skating in pools. Yeah, and they would bring their own pumps and hoses to drain like all the muck out entirely and then just like skate

that pool. And there was um at one of those pools, a kid named Tony Alva who was in that Zephyr crew. It was Tony Alva, j Adams, and Stacy Perelta, yeah, among others. Right, but those are like the big three. Tony I was your guy, right, Stacy Perelta, Oh, I thought you were like a huge Tony Alba dude. Okay, No, I respect for Tony album, but no, I was always

pal par Alta. Um. But Tony Alva at one of those pools kept going and going and pushing himself harder and harder, and then one day he cleared the coping of the pool and like caught air, yeah with his hand at first, Oh, he did like a hand plant. Yeah, that was how that originally came about. But he did leave contact with the pool, and no one had ever done that, and everyone's like, and that was like the

creation of vertue style skateboarding. UM and Alva went on at like age nineteen and found his own skateboarding company. He was the first one to use some Canadian maple Veneers, which we'll talk about UM. And it was like really innovative, especially for a nineteen year old skate punk from southern California. Yeah, they all were. Yeah, it's pretty amazing, like this collection of kids were. And it most of them ended up

being like very savvy, like wealthy businessmen like yeah. And and right after the del Mar competition, the Zephyr crew kind of scattered to the wind and went in and found purchase and and expanded skateboarding as a sport and as a theme. And one of the things that they brought with them from having been part of a crew is to form their own crews um of people that they sponsored, which made those people pros. And those pros

would go on tour. And when those pros went on tour, they were skating say palm Pearl to skateboards and showing local kids what could be done with the skateboard. And those kids would go buy pal Pearl to skateboards and go out and skate. And it that whole idea of doing demos on tour with pros who are sponsored by skateboarding companies really helped expand skateboarding in the eighties and and created that third wave where skateboarding just became it. Yeah,

I mean it was big in California and Florida. Like my cousins were way into it in Florida early on. But it really took off when kids like me and Georgia and you and Ohio we're skiing, you know, skiing skating up my like steep driveway and trying to do a little one eight turns going back down like it was a wave, and I was, you know, it was one of those silly little kids, like was so caught

up in it at first. Well, I had a kid who lived across the tracks from me who had a half pipe, like a good half pipe that his dad built him UM, and that was part of that rise

in nineteen three. I think that third wave where UM because I should say we didn't really mention UM in the late seventies, after Alva Skateboards was founded and and pau Perelta was founded and all that, UM, skateboarding took a hit mainstream wise, and it became associated with punks and like just like like just punk kids, bad kid yeah yeah, the bad kids and who literally gave skateboarding a bad name. Um. And so it was kind of

driven underground again. And then in the early eighties that experienced their rise and its image kind of changed a little bit thanks to the pal Peralta team, the Bones Brigade, who were actually like they were all young kids and they were skateboarders and all they cared about was skating. But they were also like kind of clean cut as far as um as far as skateboarders went, and like they didn't do drugs, at least they didn't publicly do drugs.

Stay was a good kid, yeah um. And so the kids that he sponsored, like Tony Hawk, Mike McGill, Steve Caballero, Christian Hassoi, all those kids were good kids too, and they had a tremendous amount of influence on the the skaters who were into them, and so it kind of changed skating's image a little bit too. It went from like being something that like punk kids were into to

something all kids were into. Yeah it um. It did go into another four year lull towards the end of the seventies before it started coming back in the mid eighties and BMX had a lot to do with it. That became more popular and um, you know some skateboarder magazine shut down or change names to a different you know title, and it just like you said, it never went away to the adherents of like like the true underground skateboarders, right, it's always there's always somebody who's been

skating at some point ever since the ninety nine. But in the mid eighties is when it definitely came back to the big time mainstream. Yeah. And I can't tell if it's just nostalgia on my part or else if that was when it like really exploded, but like that was when that was my wheelhouse. Remember the videos man, Bones Brigade videos. Yeah, and that was another thing too.

One of the reasons why UM skateboarding was able to spread as a sport or recreation or whatever UM was in part the access to cheap VHS players because the Bones Brigade made videos and people bought them, Like you could go to your local skate shop and buy like a Bones Brigade VHS tape for like twenty five or thirty bucks. You kind of had to if you wanted to learn the cool tricks. Right, It's like the only

place you could see him at the time. Yeah, and then they were produced in a way like you'd want to watch him again and again, like they think the fourth one, the Search for Animal Chin, actually had like a plot and everything. Yeah, so you would watch these things again and again. These guys became like your heroes.

And not only were you watching them do their tricks and and you know, watching their videos, but like you also wore their t shirts, like you got their deck and it said a lot Like I had a Mike McGill deck. I really was into Mike McGill. I had a Lance Mountain deck. Was really into Lance Mountain, and I like Tony Hawk and everything, but I never had a Tony Hawk deck like that. You identify with the skater based on your personality type of yeah, and your style. Yeah,

style had a lot to do with it for sure. Uh. Then there was another law in the early nineties because um of the recession is what everyone seems to blame it on. And I don't know, I thought it was weird. I don't remember that happening, But now that I think back, late high school early college that there wasn't a lot of like skate stuff going on in the world, and I wasn't skating in the time, but I was still just young enough to pick up on that fourth wave

in the early mid nineties. Well, thanks to the X games, that's what really brought it back big time. Antony Hawk too, Yeah, he kept it going. His video games definitely helped spread that fourth waves too. Um, and I guess it's never really gone away. He's bigger than ever skating. Yeah. Well, another thing I think that helped is that eighties nostalgic craze. Yeah, you know that how the eighties inform everything today. Part of that was that the I guess re exploring that

third wave of um skateboarding. So like if you're go into a band store, they're all like old Powell decks are old like UM Vision Vision street wear decks. Yeah, and slimeballs. Yeah. I have and I still have a pair of Vans Old Schools the black and white checker No, no, no, those were this, I can't remember the name of those. The slip ons. Yeah, the Old Schools are the black. They have the low top in the high top that has the little sort of white wave on the side.

But um, yeah, I still wear those shoes. Ye. So uh, I think we should talk about the skateboard itself. Um, right after this message break, So CHUCKO, we're going to talk about the skateboard itself. You promised. Yes. Um. There are three main parts. You have the deck, you have the trucks, and you have the wheels. And like we said, the trucks connect the wheels to the deck and they service the the axles on the front and the back

a little T shaped thing. Um. And I remember definitely like taking a lot of time to get your trucks the way you wanted. Some people like them really loose and some people like them a little tighter. If they're looser, you can turn more aggressively. Yeah, but you also get wobble wheel and you get wheel. But um, yeah, I like my little tighter too, Like you want to be able to turn, but you also I like the stability of a tighter truck. Um. You've also got your wheels,

which have a set of bearings. Yeah. And the wheels haven't changed too much. They're still polyurethane. They've changed in size a little bit, but it's the same basic concept and again, it still depends on your preference. Like you can buy a pre made skateboard that's all put together. But as you know, any skate worth its salt buys, the deck buys the trucks, buys the wheels that they want, puts it all together. You might as well just go to like a department store and by your skateboard, if

you're just gonna buy it all together. Yeah, with a little outfit that comes with it. One out yeah. Um. So the last part arguably the most important part, well one of three most important parts, is it the deck? Yeah, and the deck has evolved over time. We talked about how the tail kicked up in the early seventies and yeah, that allowed a lot of like tricks. Um. And the if you look at a skateboard from the top or the bottom were you're looking at the outline, that's called

the plan. And then if you look at how the tail or the nose is kicked up and then the concave to the interior of the skateboard which allows more control and stability. Um, that's called the concave. So you get the plan in the concave, and those are part of the deck. They informed the shape and size of the deck and um, then on top of that deck you have the grip tape, which I thought that would have been a recent innovation. Apparently grip tape was invented

all the way back in for scooters. They get it back then, and a guy named Ferdinand's switz Offer invented it. Nice. Yeah, and they changed the name from switz Offer tape to grip tape. Um. Yeah. And in the eighties too that the thing now is your whole board is covered with grip tape. In the mid eighties, I remember, I just had like there were graphics on tops said tape at the front and the back, and it really didn't make

any sense, like you the whole thing should be grippy. Yeah, but I mean, like again, the Powell graphics are pretty awesome. Steve Cavalilero had that your dragon or like at least you had the bones guy. Uh. The decks are not a solid piece of wood. It's actually thin layers of veneer and they are laminated and then you spread adhesive and you just you know, like with a lot of furniture, it is just many layers of thin wood compressed together

into a mold. And it's a hydraulic press that just smashes it all together until you've got your really solid piece of wood. Yeah, and it's definitely a lot stronger than just the sum of its parts. Yeah, for sure from being molded plywood. Um. And then you cut that plan out, uh. And then after that you spray it with some sealing because you don't want to accidentally alli into a puddle or a fountain or something like that and have your boardwarp or purposefully allie into a fountain.

And then the graphics are put on, and then the grip tape. I get a sense that graphics aren't like super cool anymore? Am I wrong? That it's sort of like I think it's a matter of preference. It definitely isn't like in the mid eighties it was like they were so obnoxious. Oh yeah, remember the Gator one. It was like, um, kind of like, uh, I guess a vertigo thing, but it was made out of different spikes.

You would recognize it immediately. Yeah. I definitely had the stickers on my car and like it was a thing. We had a shop in a Stone mountain called surfs up in Stone Mountains, their Stone Mountain that was obviously open for like, you know, four and a half years, and they had like skate gear in surper gear and for all of us, like you know, in in inland living people. Yeah, it was like you used to have to initially at the early wave in the early eighties, like you had to go to like a ski shop.

Skiing was already established, and then like they'd open up a little section for skateboards and then eventually got a little bigger and then all of a sudden there were actual skate shops. All right. So that is the actual uh skateboard in all its three parts. Um, and I guess we need to talk about how to ride this thing, um, yeah, because the fourth part is you. That's right. Although it looks cool just hanging on your wall. If you want

to impress the ladies, sure, like check out my skateboard. Yeah, that was all into that. Um. But it is like surfing, And the reason they compare it to surfing is that it's sort of it's like a smaller version. You have the side stands, just like on the surfboard. And if you heard our surfing podcast, you heard us talk about regular foot and Goofy foot is their mongo foot on

surfing tea. No, because you're not pushing off of it. Um, regular foot is your left foot forward, and uh, you're using your right foot to push goofy foot is the opposite of that, your right foot forwards. You're pushing with your left just does not feel right. No, And I was a mango foot and I never knew it until I looked this up. Um, that is when your left foot is forward. I'm sorry, your your right foot is on the board, but you're using your left foot to push,

and your foot is at the rear not the front. Yeah, and I just that just feels supernatural to me. But um, not supernatural, but very natural. But um, apparently mango foot is is I think you're sort of frowned upon as a person, but by real skaters if your mom like lay off, I've watched you. You can't even kick flip, so you pay attention to how you stand. That's what you say to people if they give you guff about

being mango foot. Well, the problem with mango foot is you have to shift your feet a little bit once both are back on the board. And uh, I guess you can't like bust a move immediately with a trick, uh, which matters if you're like competing for half a million dollars, but not if you're like on your way down to

the seven eleven. Yeah, if you've never skated before and you want to try it, um, I would advise to not start with mango foot at all if you don't know any better, because you know you won't be made fun of. You know, maybe is that what kept you back? Maybe you'd be like, right now, that's what it was.

But I've never seen this before. It makes sense if they if you don't know which foot you're prominent with, although I would say if you're right footage, you're probably gonna be a regular foot, and if you're goofy foot footed, you might be goofy foot. I think it has to do with handedness. So like, if you're right handed, your left foot is gonna be ford, You're gonna push with your right foot. If you're left handed, you're gonna be goofy foot. Where your right foots forward you push with

your left foot. I think you push with your foot in the rear of the dominant hand side or foot side right, Yeah, but I think your dominant hand is typically your dominant foot as well. Yeah, it seems right. And then if if, if you if somebody came up and pushed you, Yeah, that's the test. The foot you put back to steady yourself, that the one you want to use to push with before you crow hop and punch him in the head. Right, what what the h man? Yeah,

so I've never heard that. That's a little trick you can do. And I guess you're not. Maybe surprise somebody, because if you think about it too much, like all right, push me, you try to put both feet back at once and you end up just hopping. Uh. So there are a few different quite a few different things you can do. Back in the day, it was all about like the downhill slalom, which is boring, I mean, super speed is not boring. Scary, she said. I I suffered

a pretty decent head injury once. Really. Yeah, I got the wobble wheel going downhill and I was like, I got a bail out, and right before I went to go jump on the grass, the board went and I went forward and landed on my head and skidded on my head entirely. Tell it at all right, No, yes, it's like right, and uh yeah it was it was something. Yeah, I remember I have not been the same since. Its neighborhoods have one hill you know that you don't dare

go down. And my best friend his name was Chuck actually at the time, and then in high school, he had a hill like that and I remember standing at the top of it and thinking there's no way I should be doing this, and getting on the skateboard and trying to go down, and like you said, bailing out into the grass was always Uh, if you're in the neighborhood, a nice way to go about things. Is that what you did? Uh? I think I went all the way down actually, but yeah, it's a little scary, you know,

no way I do that now. I remember a car was driving past and stopped and went, oh my god, are you okay? I was like, wow, is that bad? Huh? And they finished their beer and drove on. So you also have freestyle, which is um doing tricks and things on a flat surface. Um, And we're gonna get into the tricks a little bit in a minute, which if you are like, what's free style, it sounds stupid. Look up Rodney Mullen or pare Wellinder on YouTube. Check out

some of their especially their eighties stuff. The early mid eighties, they were doing some pretty cool stuff. And some of it is like that stuff that you were saying the California dudes doing like handstands on making skateboard or just the three sixties, like standing in one place with a nose in the air. But then they would take their hands and like flip their board three sixty degrees eight times and land on it. They're pretty good, pretty great stuff,

and its for sure, it's definitely like choreography and a skateboard. Well, I have the feeling you're about to say vert skating. I wasn't, but I will. Are you ready? They didn't give rise to vert skating SKA well, vert skating, Yeah, it kind of that came out of those Dogtown guys in the swing pools. Yeah, because a pool is considered vert skating. Vert is short for vertical, right, because you're skating on vertical services like a pool or a bowl or a half pipe or a quarter pipe or whatever.

Or if you're like me, to milk crates in a piece of plywood, did you do that? Yeah, yeah, yeah, Josh pipe it was not that stable. Uh, it's a vertical is when people started leaving and catching air leaving the side of whatever surface they were on, which was really exciting at the time. Yeah, I can't imagine having been there, and it's only gone open up since then,

you know. Uh. And then you got street skating, which, um is if you've seen h ladies and dudes on the street like jumping up the air onto a park bench and grinding that park bench or a railing, or smashing themselves trying to grind a railing, that is uh street skating. Or if you've ever played the Tony Hawk video game. Did you ever play that? Yeah, the first one. Yeah, if you play that enough, people who played that enough? Now I'm talking about you start walking around in life

and everything you see. Oh man, I could grind that so hard if I could really skate. Yeah, not in real life, um, but yeah, so so street skating kind of. I guess you could say it combines freestyle with obstacles, using obstacles in the um built environment. That's street skating. Yeah, and that's the stuff that usually you'll see like frowned upon by businesses and people thinking like these hooliguns are out there right, which skateboarding is not a crime man, Nope,

Although if you use the skate go to jail. But to combat all that crime stuff, a lot of cities built skate parks in the seventies. And what they didn't realize is that, um, when those kids fell and cracked their heads, their parents were gonna sue. And so all of a sudden, the insurance premiums four skate parks went through the roof and all the cities shut them down and they went away for a very long time. And then I guess there was some changes in liability laws

that allowed skate parks to come back. And so now skate parks are back, but they're very frequently put up by cities. They're like, we'll build a skate park, and they don't ask the skaters how to build a skate park. So they build like a terrible skatepark and the skaters don't use it, and the cities are like, use skate punk kids use the skatepark, and they're like, your skate park sucks, and they're like, no, it doesn't, and yes it does in the skateaway um, or they do it

well and it's too crowded. Well, if there's one thing I know is that for every skate park in any city there will be a group of skaters saying this place sucks. I remember when we shot at a skate park. Remember these local kids and it was a new skate park. One of them, that one kid was pretty good. Yeah he's all right, but U I s him. I was like this this is great, right, this is new and it's indicator and like the sucks. Yeah. Well then that one kid lied. He said he lived from like a

seedier part of Atlanta. Hit us up for bus fair and somebody. Yeah, one of the crew saw him, like go into his house a block away and it's a very nice neighborhood Decatur and hide his skateboard in his backyard. Um, if you and they can be different, they can be like uh smaller half pipes and ramps and rails and things and obstacles. To my recommendation if you ever visit l A is to go to Venice Beach to their newish skate park there, and it is like the Cument Bowl.

It's like a huge series of connected swimming pools. And this is where you'll see some like you'll see the old school guys that aren't leaving the bowl that are just like carving it up. Is like sweet as pudding. And uh, then you've got guys that really know what they're doing, like catching air and doing you know, three sixties. And and there's a bulldog that rides a skateboard there too, I've heard of that. You should see him. It's quite amazing.

I'm for sure it is like you can't catch air or whatever, but just the fact that a dog is using a skateboard is pretty awesome. So should we talk about some tricks. Let's well, almost every trick on earth is based on the Ali the trick named after Alan Alie gelfand he invented it in the early nineteen seventies, mid nineteen seventies, and that is basically when you jump

up in the air. And if you've seen skateboarders do it, you might wonder, how on earth do they jump up in the air and have that skateboard seemingly attached to their feet. I never was very good at it, I really no, I could all be pretty good. I was more of a sidewalk surfer than like a trick aerial guy. You know. Well, I wasn't a trick aerial guy either, but I could Allie, you know, well, explain the Alie oh well, okay. So the ALIE is let's say you're

on your board and you're on a flat surface. You kick your the tail of the skateboard down really hard against the ground and uh, what this does is this um exerted force allows you to overcome the force of gravity. And since you're jumped ing at the same time you jump into the air, um, you're taking off your own

downward pressure on the board. So the front of the board, the nose, goes up high in the air and the fact that you've slapped the tail against the ground means the tail comes up into the air until it's even with the nose and the boards flat in the air, and it looks like it's attached to your feet if you do it right, and all of a sudden you and the board are four feet into the air and then you come back down and you landed. That's an ALI.

It's funny you mentioned four feet The world record Danny Wainwright of h I think he's from England, Uh, recorded at forty four and a half inch ALI. Well, it's pretty amazing, yeah, but was that like standing still? No, you know, it's like, you know, they just set up something to jump over. You keep adding layers until you know you can't jump any higher, and then you've got like, you know, ten feet to get going, and then just pop up and it looks like it's attached to his feet.

And the allie is so integral this so many other um, so many other tricks that it's it's almost not a trick any longer in and of itself. It's like the basic mechanic of whatever other trick that follows. But like you pretty much can't do anything without ali ing. And that's how those those guys originally caught air convert skating was to ali off of the coping the top and then you would catch some serious air because you already

had that extra momentum behind you as well. All Right, So we'll talk about a few of the terms here in a minute that if you watch the X Games and you're not familiar and you hear these words, we're going to clear it up for you right after this message. Okay, we're back, Chuck. We're gonna talk about the names of tricks, different types of tricks. All right. So, if you've ever watched the X Games and you hear the uh sort of annoying announcers admittedly talk using all these words you've

never heard. We're gonna explain what some of these words mean just to help you follow along a little bit. That's right. Um, you might hear speak out front side there or whatever. Front side is when you're facing the obstacle and performing a trick as opposed to backside, when you're back is to the obstacle. Yeah, Like you're basically going backwards on the skateboard. That's right. Yeah. Um. One eight is pretty basic trick. But it's um, well, it's where you ali and you and the board turn eight

degrees to face in the opposite direction. Yeah, Like you go up the ramp and then you turn the mid air and you come right back down. You can also do it on a flat surface, or you could one eighty onto like a park bench or something and trained it whatever. Um, but the one eighty also kind of forms a basis for a lot of other tricks, especially vert tricks like three sixties and five forties all the way up to ten eighties, and you can grab the side of your board and just do all sorts of

cool stuff. Tony Hawk famously completed the first nine hundred degree turn and for many years they thought that was it until a twelve year old named Tom Shar in two thousand twelve pulled off the first ten eighty and uh, they filmed that it wasn't in competition. The first one in competition was a guy named Mitch Brusco. He did at the X Games. And that is three full rotations in the air. Uh. And obviously you have to land successfully for it to count and to live and live.

And uh, it's amazing, man, three full rotations in the air. These dudes are getting up super super high. Now. Uh, have you ever heard the word fakey? I have? Fakey is um basically where you remain in your regular stance, but you're going backwards, so you're doing like, um, you're going into a backside trick. That's right. Uh. Pop shove it is when you do an ali with the one eight, but your body isn't moving. You're just uh popping up in the air and flipping the skateboard around underneath you

and then landing on it. And then we talked about grinding. Um, there's a couple of ways you can grind. A true grind is when you're on the actual axles, so you've got to be going forward, or you can go sideways and grind on your board and it's called a board slide or a rail slide. And then the kick flip, of course, is the one that you see people busting butt on which I've pulled off once. That's right, the

famous Josh kick flip. And then, of course, Chuck, there's the manual, which is another way to say a wheelie. I was good at those front side manual backside manual I could do, like I was not good. I think that's becoming clear. Like I thought it was cool if I could do a little wheelie and do a little one a D turn on the ground. Yeah, no, I'm with you, man, I understand I wasn't very good either,

But Chuck, I had years of enjoyment. Twice third Wave and fourth Wave loved skateboarding, love it like I just love skateboarding. I think everybody should go out on skateboard all the time. She's never gonna be one of those

old men that's like, quit grinding my rail. Well, yeah, I mean if I had a nice rail out trying, I'd be like, hit the hell off of my rail, but I I would Still, it's not like a hate skateboarding in general, but you would chip in and help build a half pipe in your neighborhood, maybe away from my really nice rail. Right, that's a good idea if

you do want to try skateboarding. Obviously these days, with the safety consciousness of people, you should get a helmet and some kneepads and elbow pads and if you're smart, maybe some risk guards, although that might not be cool. Well no, actually, like there's a that's another reason skate parks off and go and use is because there's local ordinances that say you have to wear a helmet and pads, and of course skaters are like that sucks. Yeah, but

the risk guards. That's a common injury because you'll you'll often go to brace yourself with your arms when you fall, and they say to try and follow in your fleshy parts of your body, but you're really kind of at the whim of where gravity takes you. At think at that point, well, you know, that was another reason I think I wasn't ever that good, just because back when I was a kid, they were all fleshy parts. It's hard to get air. We should have been safe. It was, uh,

you got anything else? No, man, that's it. Uh, skateboarding. If you want to know more about it, you should type skateboarding into the word search bar at how stuff works dot com. That's the first thing you should do. You should follow that up by watching skate videos and going to buy a skateboard and go skating. Yeah, you know, I want to get along board now? Oh yeah, yeah, that's the old man style. Yeah, just cruising. Get on a flat surface and use it a carving the concrete

way a mode of transportation. Yeah. Are you gonna learn to do handstands on it? Uh? Let's see. Since I said handstands and then laugh, that means it's time for listener mail. I'm gonna call this Josh, what are you hiding? And I'm glad to get this email because I knew I wasn't crazy. So let's just get into this, you know. Can I say I don't even remember this most recent reference? All right, well, let's just explain here what's going on.

This is from Ben Ben says, Hey, guys, I've been living like a trog globitic trug bloodt for the past six years because I just discovered your amazing podcast a few weeks ago. As penance I've been listening to UH several per day and have since gone to over one hundred. So he's binging, he said, just noticed something in UH.

During the can Cats Scuba dive episode not one of our best on August twelve, two eight, Josh goes into detail about he was a certified scuba diver and at the one time he was in open water, he not only got sea sick, but also got a slight case of the bens due to surfacing too quickly. Then UH. In two thousand thirteen and the Diving Bell episode, Chuck says, I thought I remembered many months ago you mentioned something about getting the bends, and Josh quickly and confidently retorted,

I've never had the bends. So I know this is almost five years later, but it begs the question, what are you trying to hide? Josh? You have answered some of the greatest, long lasting questions in history, but this is one of the few times where you simply added another mystery into the pile of the enigma and conspiracy that is our world. So UH, have you ever had the BENSU? So uh in I was skating down the hill and I fell in in my head. Uh. Yeah, I would call it a mild case of the bens. Okay,

so you just don't remember denying you had the bends? Okay, all right, well there's your answer. Yeah, well I not only do I not remember denying having the bends. When I denied having the bends, I had forgotten that I'd had the bends before. And again, this is a very mild case. But it wasn't just seasickness. It was directly related to having just bent half an hour under water, you know. Alright, So I would call that the case of the ben. I think that clears it up. Then

that is from Ben Helms from Mount Shasta, California. I'm sure Ben will be unsatisfied with your explanation of Ben. I just forgot. That's pretty much it. Yeah, let's see. If you want to get in touch with Chuck and I, you can tweet to us at s Y s K podcast. You can join us on Facebook dot com slash stuff. You should know. You can see us on our YouTube channel.

Just look up Josh and Chuck on YouTube. Tons of fun there, uh and send us an email stuff Podcast to Discovery dot com and really and join us at our home on the web. Stuff You should Know dot com for more on this and thousands of other topics. Is it how stuff Works? Dot com