How to Dress When Skating

In short there is no specific way you should have to dress in order to skate board.  The idea that you have to dress a certain way in order to skate is absurd.  You should wear whatever you feel most comfortable in or just feel like skating in.  Thanks to MTV and other programs which show skating makes it seem that you need to dress a certain way in order to become a great skater.  This motion could not be any more revolting and powered by greed.  These clothing companies just want you to believe that by dressing a certain way you will become a great skater, and OH they just happen to make all the clothes which will make you great.  People need to stop and think and realize hard work and dedication to the sport is what makes you great, not what kind of pants you are wearing.  When you actually stop and think about it, the greatest skaters are the ones who do not fit the mold of the modern day skater.  An example of a great skater who exemplifies that you can wear whatever you want and still be the best is Rodney Mullen.  I have seen Rodney Mullen perform some of the most insane intricate tricks ever done while wearing a Mickey Mouse shirt.  The clothing companies that sponsor these skaters just want to make you believe that by wearing the backwards flat brimmed hat, name jean pants, and baggy shirt that somehow you will bestowed magic skate board powers.  The fact of the matter is that unless you put in the time and effort no amount of clothing will make you a great skater or a better person.

Incorperate "You" Into Your Skating

When I say incorporate "You" into your skating what I am trying to convey is that everyone is an individual and it should show through their skating, this is a huge issue now a days in my opinion.  All of these skate board videos and competitions on television make it seem as if there is only one way to skate board.  The idea that there is only one way to skate has essentially taken allot of the joy from skating for many skaters and has made it almost into a part time job.  Rather than going to the skate park and skating just for the fun of it, I have run into individuals who have called it training.  Personally I find this pretty pathetic and this kind of attitude just ruins the joy that skating can bring.  When skate boarding if you are a goofy kid, display through your skating.  An example of this would be doing tricks such as the lunch break which is pretty much the goofiest trick ever.  Another example would be is that I also break dance so I usually incorporate hand stands and flips into my lines.  I am not saying that you should skate according to your attitude solely, but if you want to incorporate your personality into your skating don't hold back.  I have been to plenty of parks and have seen hundreds of carbon copy skaters who all dress the same, act the same, do the same lines, and skate the park in the exact same way.  Being this way defeats the purpose of skating which is to have fun and is an excellent form of self expression.

The Joy Of Skating Bowls

Personally, I find skating bowls way more enjoyable than skating a normal mini ramp.  I do not like to skate extremely large bowls, but instead a mid size one about six and half feet or so.  A bowl is like a mini ramp except it resembles a pool and can be skated in a number of ways.  Typically a mini ramp can only be skated in one fashion while a bowl can be shred in a number of ways.  The great thing about bowls is that you never have to push if you skate it correctly.   A mini ramp can take away some of your speed while a bowl on the other hand just accelerates you.  A place that has a great bowl which is in Illinois is Krush Skate Park.  This skate park has a decent size bowl and it never needs to be waxed which is a definite plus.  Other parks around Illinois like NorthBrook Skate Park has a huge bowl which is nearly un-skateable.  Personally I find these bowls to be entirely way too large to skate and really take the fun out of coasting in them.  When skating a bowl it is extremely important to push hard into the curves in order to pick up speed.  Another important aspect is to keep your wheels pressed firmly against the walls of the bowl otherwise again you will lose speed.  Another thing to point out is to be mindful of who is skating the bowl around you.  When skating a bowl it is extremely easy to get lost in the moment and skate the bowl entirely way to long.  This is just a reminder when skating bowls to better the experience of all the riders.  Seeing other riders shred the bowl gives other skaters inspiration and allows you to see what others are doing.

What Are Old School Tricks?

There are a number of old school skate boarding tricks.  When people say "old school" what they are talking about is the tricks which were performed before the Ollie and modern day flip tricks exploded onto the scene.  A few old school tricks include boneless, no comply, hand stands, finger flips, and caspers.  The boneless trick in essence is an Ollie without using your feet.  In order to do the boneless you must have both your feet on the board while moving in a forward direction.  While in the forward direction take your back foot off the board while at the same time grabbing the middle of the board with your hand closest to the nose of the board. When taking your foot off the board, do a quick foot plant while lifting the board with your hand.  Quickly do a 180 or a 360 and land back on the board and roll away from the trick in a clean fashion.  Another trick which is old school and sort of like a boneless is the no comply.  A no comply is where you take your back foot off the board in the same manner as  boneless but you pop the board while taking your foot off.  By popping the board you can quickly make it do a 180 without having to touch any part of the board with your hand.  A truly old school skate board trick is the hand.  This trick is also extremely dangerous so be very careful if you dare attempt it.  While rolling bend down and press up into a hand stand while the board continues to move.  When you have completed the hand stand slowly lower your feet back onto the board and ride away into the night!  Lastly the finger flip is essentially the same as a kick of heel flip except you spin the board with your fingers but be warned, this trick will damage your fingers.  These are just a few of the foundation tricks which have now been coined as old school.

Skating Around Campus Rant

I have no idea why skate boarding is considered such a horrible ordeal.  I had a bad day at school today and decided ot blow off some steam skate boarding, but what do you know I get a ticket.  I was not grinding, jumping, or anything litterally just coasting around the campus.  Then what do you know, one of normals great officers of the law rights me a ticket and lectures me about how skate boarding is dangerous.  I tried to argue with him and explain that I was just riding around, slowly I might add, when he came and approached me.  For some reason at my school bikes are free to wiz through the quad, topple people over, ride on the road, and have their own parking.  My big question is what is the big difference between a skate board and a bicicle.  Both of these items are for recreation and can be used as a form of transportation.  In the town of Normal however, riding a skate board is practically like walking into a movie theater wearing a vest of TNT.  This town really needs to get its priorities straight when each week I have to read abotu people getting mugged and girls getting harassed on their way home at night.  I would not put it past the town of Normal to try and blame skate boarding for these crimes.  Instead of Normals officers stopping me midday when I am not doing anything wrong, they should be out at night protecting the people of Normal from real crimes.

Staying Hydrated While Skating

It is extremely important to stay hydrated when skate boarding.  I know from experience that allot of these parks have horrible water fountains and that is why I must urge you to bring your own bottle.  Staying hydrated will allow you to perform better as well as remain healthy.  Although this is not stressed very often it is super important that you remain hydrated or you could get heat stroke.  A kid at the skate park that I go to actually had a heat stroke at the park.  The kid was skating in eighty five degree weather while wearing a hooded sweatshirt and a beanie.  I know that this is typically the look of skaters, but seriously why put yourself through that torture.  Typically I skate in shorts and a short sleeve shirt in order to cool off my body as much as possible.  According to extreme nutrition”
Lack of water is the number 1 trigger of daytime fatigue. Preliminary research indicates that 8-10 glasses of water a day is capable of significantly easing back and joint pain for up to 80% of sufferers.
A mere 2% drop in body water is capable triggering fuzzy short-term memory trouble with basic math, and difficulty focusing on the computer screen or on a printed page."  Unfortunately, it seems that every skate park I have been to always has skaters that are extremely dehydrated.  In order to prevent these malfunctions due to being dehydrated I would recommend bringing an entire gallon of water to the skate park with you.  Also, eating bananas will revitalize your body with potassium stopping such dehydration pains such as "Charlie Horses."

Protective Gear

Protective gear is essential when skate boarding.  The essential gear to have is a helmet, knee pads, elbow pads, wrist guards, and a ankle braces.  Personally I typically just wear the helmet, but that is only because I am strapped for cash and currently cannot afford all of these items.  So if you are like me a poor college student at least get the helmet.  A helmet can save you from some extremely nasty falls and potentially save your life.  On the internet you can see thousands of videos of skate boarding injuries, and by far the worst kind to witness are head injuries.  In a majority of these videos the skaters are going extremely fast and their board flies out from underneath them creating a whipping motion and smacking the back of their head against the ground.  The worst video I witnessed was in regards to a guy bleeding from his ears after hitting his head so hard.  This is why I must urge all of you to at the very least buy a helmet.  The other injuries which are most common to skate boarders involve the wrists and the ankles.  When falling, you typically catch yourself before you hit the ground with your hands which puts and extreme amount of pressure onto your wrists.  The wrist guards are able to take a majority of the shock enabling you to not break your wrists.  The last piece of equipment I would like to touch on are the ankle braces.  The most common injury of skaters involves breaking the ankle or a horrible sprain, do yourself a favor and invest in ankle braces.

Skating In the Winter?

Skateboarding in the winter definitely can be done if you know what you are doing.  Skating in the winter is very different than skating with the warmer weather and comes at a price.  During the winter you are much more likely to break decks, ruin trucks, and destroy bearings.  The snow is a huge factor in the determination of your equipment.  First lets talk about how a deck gets destroyed from the winter.  The deck which is made of wood contracts and expands depending on the temperature.  Dramatic temperature changes can cause your deck to literally come apart since the plies of the deck begin to break away from each other.  Another harmful aspect that winter brings and negatively affects the quality of your deck is the moisture.  The moisture due to the winter months causes the skate board to become water logged which makes it much more difficult to do flip tricks and ollies.  The last factor which really destroys decks in the winter is the salt.  Salt from the deicing of sidewalks and streets gets kicked up onto your board while you ride causing it to be eaten by the salt.  The salt causes the board to deter ate and essentially breaking your deck.  Another aspect of the board which is negatively affected by these weather conditions are the bearings.  Bearings are extremely sensative to the moisture and the salt.  The salt and the moisture from the road will cause your bearings to rust over in very little time ruining your skating experience.

WoodWard

Camp WoodWard is without a doubt skate boarding Mecca.  WoodWard is a camp dedicated to nothing but skating.  This camp is huge with numerous outdoor parks as well as indoor.  In order to go to this magical place you will need about one thousand dollars.  This camp is located in Pennsylvania and involves you staying for about six days.  Although this is super expensive this facility is extremely nice and definitely worth the money if you have the discretionary income available to you.  This park is extremely cool since there are actual lessons involved at this facility.  According to campwoodward.com "Daily Instruction is not only educational but also fun when done the "Woodward Way."  Upon arrival to camp our skateboard staff will oversee a testing period where you will be placed into instruction groups based on your age and ability level.  Two and a half hours a day will be spent with some of the best Skateboarding Staff from around the country, navigating the vast complex and working on improving your skating."  Having the insight of professional skateboarders will greatly give you an edge over other skaters.  These pros have valuable insight which easily could be applied to your skating improving it drastically.  This camp also offers foam pits, and ramps which are virtually impossible to get hurt on.  The camp also pairs you with skaters around your own age and skill level.  By grouping skaters in this fassion it will allow you to make new friends and skate with people who are progressing at the same rate as yourself.  Again, if you have the spare time and money I would highly recommend going to camp Woodward.

Mostly Skateboarding Blog

While creating my own blog I thought that it would be a good idea to check out what other skate board blogs are talking about.  One blog that seems to be the leader of the pack is http://www.mostlyskateboarding.net/ as well as http://127skate.webs.com/.  This link which I provided will lead you to the other skate blog that this post will be analyzing.  This blog mostly deals with video submissions, which technically is a video log but yet this is still under the umbrella of a blog.  This blog was extremely interesting since all the videos were super cool and very entertaining.  I also liked how extremely simple the blog was.  There are virtually no updates in regards to typed letters but every month there are new videos that fellow skaters submitted.  Personally this a genius plans since this blog is generating traffic and revenue by using other skater’s ideas and videos.  This site was also interesting since there was a section for updates regarding new parks.  This section had photo updates of the construction of new parks.  What I also liked about this blog is that it included a twitter section.  Personally I find twitter to be the largest waste of time and really the most pathetic way of communicating ever, but the owner of this blog is making a small fortune from it.  Overall this a very creative blog in the sense that the owner just chooses videos he likes from the submissions and puts them into his blog.  This in an ingenious idea which allows him to be extremely versatile and offer a plethora of different skate videos each month.

Skating Creatively

A huge aspect in the skating world is in regards to style.  Many skaters would describe style as how you act and how you incorporate this into your skating.  Personally I have an extremely goofy style which involves allot of old school tricks such as boneless's and no complies.  In order to have a fun style you must be able to think outside of the box.  When approaching a skate park you should think of new and inventive ways to skate the terrain rather than just using the park how it was intended.  This exactly type of thinking is what gave birth to street skating.  Street skating involves skaters to find everyday items and turn them into their own personal skate oasis.  At the skate park you should pretend that it is an actual street course and try to use it in a unique way.  This can be done in a number of different ways including doing tricks that are normally not done on a certain obstacle.  An example of this would be to do a 360 boneless up a step up, rather than just kick flipping up it etc.  Another way to use a park differently is to use obstacles in the opposite fashion than what they were intended.  An example of this would be to skate up the stair set (if its small enough), rather than just throwing tricks down the set.  By using the park in a unique fashion it is more likely to get your skating noticed.  No one wants to see the same tricks over and over again, so by utilizing the park in a different way you have the possibility of being recognized for your abilities.  In essence try and look at the park in a way which will allow you to skate it the way you envision in.