Tag: Fear

Tips to Overcome the Fear of an Ollie while Moving

Tricks

Understanding the Fear

As for every fear, in order to overcome it you must find out what is actually scaring you. Obviously what scares us most when skateboarding is falling on the ground, and the pain that comes with it. But what makes you believe that you are going to fall ? Sometime we are not exactly scared about falling but scared about falling going fast because our brain is convinced that the faster you go the more painful the crash.

failed ollie falling skateboard
At this moment I though I was going to die.

It may be true in some case, if you step of your board at full speed you are probably going to fall harder that if you were static. Most of the time the scariest gap for a beginner is going from to performing a trick stationary to performing it rolling. That is perfectly understandable because as you are moving, physics are changing. Your balance will be challenged and the trucks are not going to respond the same way.

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I can’t ollie while ridding, why ?

Tricks

As you may know, my main problem at the moment is getting my ollie to work while I’m actually moving. I have been able to pop decent height ollies, but only stationary. Every time I try to ollie while moving, even at really low speed, I seem to only be able to do “popless” ollies where the tail doesn’t even hit the ground but the rear wheels still lift just a little. Or I do pop the tail, but my front foot doesn’t slide and I do a rocket ollie and usually fall.

Why is it happening ? I guess there are several reasons :

  • Fear, I’m scared to fall and so I don’t commit completely
  • Foot position, my front foot is more near the front of the deck when I’m ridding than stationary, for balance purpose.
  • Poor technique, I have noticed on some videos that I dont slide the side of my shoe but more the bottom.

How I can solve it ?

Grow some balls and commit ? Yeah, but I need to be sure I’m doing it the right way to feel confident. But I definitely need to practice my ollie more.

So maybe I should practice ollies stationary until I’m sure I have a good technique and then try it rolling ?

If you have or had the same struggle, feel free to comment so I know I’m not alone.