I like the floating feeling you get on quarter
pipes, it feels like you’re hanging in the air and you can with
no trouble grab anywhere on the board. One of the most fun
tricks on a QP is the air to fakie.
Airs to fakies are also one of the easiest tricks. All you have
to do is ride straight at the QP on your shred stick. I like
this trick because of its simplicity. An air to fakie is
basically the same thing as straight airing a jump, except the
QP shoots you straight up in the air … so you land in the same
spot you took off. All you have to do is ride straight at the QP.
When approaching a QP, pick a straight line up the wall and stay
totally flat-based while riding up the transition. If you get on
edge, you may go flinging left or right—you won’t go as big.
Always keep your knees bent.
When you reach the top of the lip, you don’t need to pop much,
keep your body solid and let the QP do all the work for you.
Remember: Like hips and wall rides, start out small to feel out
the transition, then you can “send it.” So, now you’ve left the
lip, try to stay composed. Fly up in the air and grab the board.
I like to grab front side.
You’re floating and tweaked-out front side now, look down at the
coping to make sure you’ll land back in the transition. As long
as the QP has vert on it, you should be fine. If so, then you’re
good to go—if not, well, good luck, ’cause landing on the deck
of a QP is sketchy. Anyway, as you come back down to land, you
should land in about the same place you left the lip—nice and
high on the transition.
Ride back down the tranny switch and pump back up the hill as
far as possible. You’ll have less of a hike to hit the quarter
pipe next time. Once you learn this trick, then you can move on
to frontside and backside airs.
Boxes are a great feature to learn board slides, front boards,
and 270-outs on because they're super easy to shred. Boxes are
nice and wide compared to a handrail, so you don't need to worry
if you're not perfectly centered on the box. For a board slide,
hop on the box at a 90-degree angle and stay centered over the
board, flat-based, until you reach the end of the box—it's too
easy. So instead, I'm going to walk you through the board slide
to 270 out.
Approaching a box is pretty mellow; you don't need to hit it
from a crazy angle or anything. Just stay calm and loose, and
roll up on it. It is good to pop off your toes on the takeoff
and land in more of a tail slide, instead of landing totally
square in the middle of the box—it makes snapping the 270 out
easier. Now that you're sliding, stay over the board so it
doesn't spit out in front of you. Hold the position with your
knees bent.
As you near the end of the box, begin to rotate your head and
shoulders in the front side direction. Spring an ollie off your
back foot and initiate the front side spin—use your shoulders to
direct the rotation. The front 270 feels just like a front side
three, but it's easier to land. If you keep your eyes on the
ground and bend your knees with the board pointed straight down
the hill, you shouldn't have a problem with the landing.
Now that you have learned several common tricks, feel free to go
out and try them. If you fail, remember, practice makes perfect
and even more practice makes you even more perfect, or at least
that is what I have been told. Go out their and try your best,
and you are sure to get the results that you are after. Good
Luck!
