regressing ability to do tricks

[SK8ERatWAR]

how the f*ck is it possible that, i seem to regress at my ability to skateboard, i'm now 18 and i started at the age of 12, landed an ollie and a shuv it the first day i ever skateboarded, continuing through the years i learned many more tricks rock to fakie, rock n roll, 5050 lip, smith lip, ollie rock n rolls, blunt spine transfers, 5050 grind, smith , 5-0, bs crooked, bs noseslide, kickflip, fs shuv, heelflip, varrial kickflip, varrial heelflip, nollie flip, nollie varrialflip etc. etc. hell i could ollie and fs 180 ollie 2 feet high at one time.
but seriously all those flatground tricks, i could never do again after i landed the first one.. :confused:
and since a couple of years, i started getting worse at every fucking other trick, needing more tries and eventually not able to do them anymore.. WTF
only tricks that i can still do are rocknrolls, 5050 lips, 1 inch ollies and 180 ollies, that's fucking it.
Tell me guys, please, how the fuck is this possible??? I'm getting seriously depressed and don't have fun skateboarding anymore, now i've come to a point that i'm just selling my board or trading it in for a longboard, because just riding is still enjoyable.

I hope none of you guys ever experienced this or have to experience this
but could someone tell me, how is it possible?
btw i skated every weekend and holidays i could, so the problem can't lie in that

[NotedDerk]

I experience this constantly, it's just one aspect to skating that you have to deal with.

Sometimes you feel that you just lost the trick completely because you can't land it one day and the reality of it is just that you're having bad luck with it that day.

Say I go to the park on a daily basis for a month and learn a bunch of new tricks and if I decide to skip going to the park for just a week, when I come back, odds are, I am going to either forget how to land a majority of them, get scared, or just take a thousand tries to get ONE of my tricks back. This isn't the same for all skaters either, i'm sure some would beg to differ, but we all have our own experience with it. The curves come along and this just sounds like one of yours and eventually you'll come out of it, practice is everything, no matter how many tries. It's never fun to not land something after a tremendous amount of attempts, but it's so gratifying to finally land what you've been waiting for.

but if you're not having fun skating, then by all means, try another hobby, maybe skating just isn't for you. A lot of people mature out of it or just lost interest because of how much you have to put into it. The whole reason I skate is because I can't go a day without it, whether it's just watching videos on youtube or playing skate 2/3 or going out to skate. It's just one of my main attributes to remaining sane and happy.

[DonVigo]

Happens to me all the time. I think it's (for me) part of a mental thing. I get SO stoked on my new trick that giving it 100 tries in a day and landing 10 feels awesome. I go home feeling accomplished, and feel like I've got a new trick in my bag. Shitty thing for me is... I'm old... And I might make it to the park once a week, so I don't really develop the muscle memory as fast. When I come back a week later for that trick, I'm not as stoked, and if I've only landed my new trick once in 10 tries, it's a little discouraging, but I've always got something else on the back burner, so I just focus on the next trick.

Just don't let yourself bum yourself out too much. That seems to be a killer. Remember, this shit is MUCH more mental than physical. Sometimes, just thinking you can't do something is going to screw you.

Plus, it's the age of the cell phone cam. You can always film the trick you're not getting and try to break it down to see where it goes wrong. I've found myself doing that a lot lately, it really helps if you know what you're doing wrong.

[m.seven]

happened to me after i blew my ACL in my knee.i used to be pretty good,sponsered by a local shop and skating everyday.after the injury i didn't skate for months and lost just about everything.
i can still skate a little as long as i wear my clunky ass kneebrace,but being 37 yrs. old time has taken its toll on my body.25+ yrs. skating will do that i guess.

Don's right,alot of it is mental.i'll never erase the fear of blowing my knee again,so i've got some severe mental limits.

but you have to remember one thing,as popular as skateboarding is only a small percentage of people really know what it feels like to land a tre flip,grind a rail,or even just cruise down the street.nobody that's never skated will understand that feeling..i just feel lucky to be one of the people that does.

[knexzor]

hang in there and it will come back man, you're just 18 dude!
most importantly don't let it get to you, just do stuff that feels fun

[thesignguy]

learn to carve in a bowl and you will never care about tricks again.

[SK8ERatWAR]

learn to carve in a bowl and you will never care about tricks again.
there isn't a single bowl for miles where i live.. :P


hang in there and it will come back man, you're just 18 dude!
most importantly don't let it get to you, just do stuff that feels fun
the only thing that feels fun now is just simple cruising, that's why i'm gonna buy a longboard
btw could you guys tell me some decent longboard companies?


but you have to remember one thing,as popular as skateboarding is only a small percentage of people really know what it feels like to land a tre flip,grind a rail,or even just cruise down the street.nobody that's never skated will understand that feeling..i just feel lucky to be one of the people that does.
have never done a tre flip but cruisin' down the street.. man, that really makes you feel alive, that's seriously the only thing that is left for me in skateboarding


Happens to me all the time. I think it's (for me) part of a mental thing. I get SO stoked on my new trick that giving it 100 tries in a day and landing 10 feels awesome. I go home feeling accomplished, and feel like I've got a new trick in my bag. Shitty thing for me is... I'm old... And I might make it to the park once a week, so I don't really develop the muscle memory as fast. When I come back a week later for that trick, I'm not as stoked, and if I've only landed my new trick once in 10 tries, it's a little discouraging, but I've always got something else on the back burner, so I just focus on the next trick.

Just don't let yourself bum yourself out too much. That seems to be a killer. Remember, this shit is MUCH more mental than physical. Sometimes, just thinking you can't do something is going to screw you.

Plus, it's the age of the cell phone cam. You can always film the trick you're not getting and try to break it down to see where it goes wrong. I've found myself doing that a lot lately, it really helps if you know what you're doing wrong.
it's not that i just need more tries for a trick, but every time i learned a new trick, i landed it once and was never able to do it again.. only an ollie, 180 and pop shuv.. that's it.. I know how much pleasure and fullfillment it gives when you land a trick where you've worked on, but that's just not the case anymore, i can't land any trick, and that takes away the feeling of accomplishment and ultimately the fun in skateboarding.


but if you're not having fun skating, then by all means, try another hobby, maybe skating just isn't for you. A lot of people mature out of it or just lost interest because of how much you have to put into it. The whole reason I skate is because I can't go a day without it, whether it's just watching videos on youtube or playing skate 2/3 or going out to skate. It's just one of my main attributes to remaining sane and happy.
skateboarding is my life too, watching skatevids, playing skate.. but not skateboarding anymore, because it's just a damn agony to know you had a simple 50-50 grind on lock and are just not able to do it anymore

[m.seven]

have never done a tre flip but cruisin' down the street.. man, that really makes you feel alive, that's seriously the only thing that is left for me in skateboarding

that's all you need,man.:D

[EternalRewind]

Practice makes perfect... If you dont use it you lose it... These sayings are true from my experience... When I was 17-21 I could do 360 flips back to back all day but now a days it takes me like 20 tries to land one because I dont really skate much now...So pick one flip trick and practice it for an hour each day and you should get it down

[replicant]

If you're not skating and practicing your tricks every other day to everyday, then you're gonna start losing focus on how you landed them in the first place. Unless you have some serious natural talent (aka prodigy) then taking a week off over and over again is going to cause your skating ability to decline pretty ferociously.

[Ohmidineffect]

This happened to me after I broke my ankle, I got hit with fear on every trick, I just cruised for a while and then I just rode around the streets doing boneless' footplants simple tricks just for the hell of it. Like what derk said it's what you make it!

[DonVigo]

the only thing that feels fun now is just simple cruising, that's why i'm gonna buy a longboard
btw could you guys tell me some decent longboard companies/

The only thing that touches the fun of bowl riding, for me, is bombing down mellow hills. I used to live in a downtown area that was all mellow hills... I miss those days. Grabbing beers at the bottom, walking up, skating back down for more beers...

Anyway, screw a longboard. I swear nobody realizes how good they AREN'T for cruising unless you're going straight, or you're a real downhiller. Get an old school reissue, or a nice 9+ inch wide deck, some big Indy's, and some soft 60-65mm wheels. You'll actually have a turning radius that will allow you to... Turn... Like on sidewalks and stuff. It will cruise, but you won't have to do the "longboard dip" to push, and your setup will look MUCH cooler.

Trust me, owned a few longboards, and nothing touched the control I had on my Powell Vatos Bones reissue and Pool Bomber wheels.

[rzrfvr]

Anyway, screw a longboard. I swear nobody realizes how good they AREN'T for cruising unless you're going straight, or you're a real downhiller.

I second that!

Oh and I'm pretty sure that you can get better at getting worse on a skateboard. I've seen so many kids that don't commit to the trick. Practicing not commiting is the worst thing you can do, since you'll just teach your body to not land the trick. Some kids I see have a whole lot of fliptricks on lock with one foot landings (with one foot on the ground) :rolleyes:

[Ohmidineffect]

I third the whole cruise wheel setup, I put 60 mms on a standard size deck with risers and a set of indys its wayy smoother and compact than a long board. As for getting better after losing tricks I'd say literally just go out in front of your house and skate down the street pick a trick and commit to landing that trick 8 to 10 times in a row with out your feet coming off the board. After six or seven in a row you;ll feel better about it again. I just set up a board for tricks and I rode the same street till I had my ollies 180s front shuvs and heelflips back. Lost them a WHILE ago and decided on not learning em again. Bad moves.

[sarsparillo]

Just be glad you didn't snap a tendon in your ankle right before moving country to somewhere with a zero tolerance policy on skateboarding downtown and no skate parks. Also, you moved to a downtown apartment and didn't have a car and basically I had over a year with no skateboarding and a permanently weak left ankle that sometimes gives out.

I have no idea what I can still do tranny, but on ground I'm back down to tiny ollies, shuvs, reverts and shitty little nose and boardslides on the curb. I miss hitting up parks :(

[SK8ERatWAR]

I second that!

Oh and I'm pretty sure that you can get better at getting worse on a skateboard. I've seen so many kids that don't commit to the trick. Practicing not commiting is the worst thing you can do, since you'll just teach your body to not land the trick. Some kids I see have a whole lot of fliptricks on lock with one foot landings (with one foot on the ground) :rolleyes:
That is exactly what i'm dealing with, i had them all on lock with one foot landings..


The only thing that touches the fun of bowl riding, for me, is bombing down mellow hills. I used to live in a downtown area that was all mellow hills... I miss those days. Grabbing beers at the bottom, walking up, skating back down for more beers...

Anyway, screw a longboard. I swear nobody realizes how good they AREN'T for cruising unless you're going straight, or you're a real downhiller. Get an old school reissue, or a nice 9+ inch wide deck, some big Indy's, and some soft 60-65mm wheels. You'll actually have a turning radius that will allow you to... Turn... Like on sidewalks and stuff. It will cruise, but you won't have to do the "longboard dip" to push, and your setup will look MUCH cooler.

Trust me, owned a few longboards, and nothing touched the control I had on my Powell Vatos Bones reissue and Pool Bomber wheels.
ok then, think i should do that then.. what are some sites for old school boards that ship international?


If you're not skating and practicing your tricks every other day to everyday, then you're gonna start losing focus on how you landed them in the first place. Unless you have some serious natural talent (aka prodigy) then taking a week off over and over again is going to cause your skating ability to decline pretty ferociously.
yeh i didn't do that, i just don't have that time, i could only skate in the weekends.. and i'm definitely not a prodigy, so i'm gonna keep it with cruising, carving and simple tricks :) that's good enough for me!