Cross Academy Curb
C urb Grind and Walk
Project date - February, 2008
Stepping and walking while grinding
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One foot grind: stepping while grinding
This documentation of some of my Cross Academy tricks was done on Wednesday, February 18, 2009. I had been practicing some grinding routines on a curb not far from my apartment. I hadn't shot any of the moves, and since I was going to be moving, I figured that I better get some footage. I took my camera out and set it up on a tripod and shot myself performing a few of my curb longboard walk and step routines. As it turned out, the day turned into bad weather, with cold turning to snow turning to sleet. The skating conditions weren't that bad, as the curb was easy to grind on. The only problem was that I got wet and cold, and couldn't skate as well as I could have. The shots and clips are good enough to show some basic Cross Academy grind tricks.
Location notes: this is a long curb running down a gentle hill. It's pretty low and has a metal edge. This particular curb gets overgrown with weeds in the summer and can be like riding in a green wave when the weeds are high, but if they get too high it can be completely unrideable. The curb is really isolated and no maintenance people come by. In the winter, the weeds dry up and mostly fall off. There are still a few left, which gives the curb a little personality.
There's one spot on the hill that I need clear to do this, on the side of the road where downhill will be a frontside grind, using a driveway to mount. If there's a truck or bus parked there, I can't skate the same tricks. I'd have to ollie, and it's much harder to cross step after an ollie, or landing it in a cross step. There was one bus parked on the spot, several yards down from the driveway, but it didn't mess up the run too bad. I just had to turn past him, which put me out into traffic, but there wasn't much. It wasn't ideal traffic conditions, but it was good enough to do the tricks.
Weather notes: Today was a cold day, but it didn't seem like it would turn into bad weather. Cold weather is nice for trick skating, because on the technical side, the curb is really hard and grinds without hangups. On the social side, the cold weather keeps away people who might interfere with your skating: homeless people, pedestrian passersby, police, cab drivers, and truckers.
Unfortunately for the skating part of the shoot, the weather got really nasty and turned from snow flurries to freezing rain and sleet. It ended the shoot early, but the snowflakes in the footage give it a texture that looks different from any shots I've ever done, so in that respect I'm happy with the outcome. The skating isn't bad, considering, and shows what I'm trying to do.
Board notes: Sector 9 Phoenix. The board is a street board that is on the long side, 45 inches. It's very stiff and is not a flexible carving board. It is bouncy and ollies pretty well. It's quite heavy and will hold momentum in a grind well enough that you can take one or two steps and not stop the grind. I used the board that I've been riding for my overland tour project, which uses soft wheel board setups. It makes mounting the curb easier, because the wheels are bigger. There is some problem with the grabbiness of soft wheels that makes grinding with them kind of inflexible- meaning you cant slide the wheels much to correct a mistake or angle your board. It's just a coincidence I used soft wheels, you could use smaller hard wheels for these tricks just as well.
Trick overview: The routines are really straightforward- mount the curb and take a step, or start in a cross stance and step back or forward once you're up on the curb. You try to grind in cross stance or step past the cross stance into a narrow side by side stance farther up the board. Review the walk the board sections elsewhere on this site if this is not clear. I'll describe what I'm trying to do in each of these routines, which were captured in video clips.
Progress of the shoot notes: It was really fun at first. I did a straight grind, a cross step grind and exit past the bus into the street, and one with an exit into the curb using a slow kick turn. I reviewed the footage and set up for a second clip and that's when the weather started to turn bad. First there were some snow flurries. That was no problem. When the flurries turned into snow with heavy flakes I started worrying about the camera a bit. I should have closed the screen which was out, but I forgot.
I started getting wet and cold. You can see in the sequence where I walk past the camera that my pants are getting wet. I didn't have gloves on, and for this shot, no hat. I also didn't use long johns for this shoot, wanting to be as unemcumbered as possible for walking the board. The lack of proper clothing definitely cut the shoot short and probably messed up my skating at the end.
Cross Stance Grind
This sequence shows a single cross step up into a cross stance grind, from out of a regular stance mount of the curb.
Using the driveway, I mount the curb, in a regular stance, but standing way back on the tail, in a narrow stance. See all the cross stepping details on the Reef page, where I break down board walking tricks and techniques.
Here I take a step while grinding. I bend my front (left) foot and keep the weight on it. Then I cross over the back (right) leg and hold the stance.
I continue to glide in cross stance. Using a heavy board helps, and just being loose in the ankles and trying not to make a jerky movement that will hang the truck up.
I uncross and step my right foot back. So I went from a cross stance, back pedaled one step back to a regular stance on the tail. If there's some speed left, it should be easy to dismount the curb.
I just roll off the curb or kick turn off it. If I hung up at this point, I could probably pull it off, it would be an axle stall, and I would kick turn or pop the tail a little.
This is one of the easier cross step grinds to do, because you don't take a full two steps onto the nose. The only one that's easier, I think, is starting in a cross stance and rolling up onto the curb, then stepping up into a regular stance. That walk trick is shown below.
Cross Stance Grind, second try
Here is another sequence of the same move, with some different styling.
I pick up my foot pretty far to do this cross. It means I'm riding the board like a skate, or you could say that it's a one foot grind, briefly, until I set the foot down crossed. You can make it less of a one foot by keeping the foot low and quickly brushing it past your leg as you step.
Here is the cross grind.
I backpedal quickly and replace my foot on the tail.
In this sequence I had more arch in the body styling. That arch is going to put the weight more away from the curb. This may make for less hang ups. There are two basic balance and friction problems when you're grinding. If the truck is too locked into the curb it may have too much friction and hang up. If it drifts too far off the curb, it'll flip the board out from under you. The grind is harder to keep smooth when you're changing foot positions, but that's the challenge with these tricks.
Exit and Kick Turn
This is a way to exit the trick after dismounting the curb. It's a big kick turn that rocks the board up onto the curb.
After kicking off the curb, I'm turning left, heading out into the street.
Here I change rails, shifting my weight right. I start to rotate my shoulders to the right, clockwise.
I want to do a nice big smooth kick turn, like a surf kickout with a longboard. If my shoulders spin slowly, the turn will be smooth and not jerky.
I kick turn and ride the wheelie a bit while turning.
The board goes up over the curb and that stops it. In this case, I stop and pick up the board and walk up to start another sequence. From this point, I could rock and roll back off the curb and keep going.
Hokey Pokey Grind
In this routine, I start in a cross stance, uncross to regular on the way onto the curb, then cross step again. I call it a hokey pokey because you put your right foot forward, back, then forward. The start of this routine is, I think, the easiest cross step grind trick. You start crossed, but don't really have to do any cross grinding. You roll up onto the curb and grind a straight 50-50. It's a pretty cool longboard move, and it shouldn't take long to figure it out. What makes this routine harder, is I take another step after the first backpedal and cross grind a ways.
I roll toward the curb with my right foot crossed in front. The only difficulty here is to be able to steer in a cross stance. That is a basic skill. Just as the board hits the driveway and begins to mount the curb, I begin to uncross.
Here I'm on the curb, and have uncrossed my right foot and stepped it back and placed it on the tail. I keep my weight consistently on the left foot, I don't change weight. For a few feet, I'm doing a basic grind trick, a 50-50.
Next I pick up my right foot, which was the back foot, and cross step it forward. This puts me in a cross stance, and I ride the cross grind a ways.
After the cross grind, I back pedal once again and return to a regular stance on the tail. At this point the board slows and practically stops.
Throughout the routine my weight was on my left leg. By shifting weight to my right (back) leg, I can turn or kick turn off the curb.
Another fairly easy cross academy way to mount curbs is to do a reverse turn first. It's pretty similar to the above sequence. The first cross step would be a back pedal back into a cross stance, instead of a forward step into a cross stance. Then you steer the reverse turn onto the driveway and uncross as you grind, leaving you in a 50-50. The reverse turn, or reverse drop knee turn, is on the Reef page, and at some point I'll do this trick in a shoot. I meant to do it for this one but the snow got too heavy and shortened the shoot.
