Lol that's something you have to just get used to here in Michigan... not to mention the winters do a number on our roads and other pavement so there's plenty of crust everywhere
Switch heelflips are easier because of the shoulder position that's inherent in stance. You know when someone is skating switch because their shoulders are parallel with the board and look 'closed off'. This makes it easier to move your flipping foot out in front of you. When skating your regular stance your chest is opened up toward the nose a bit and it's more awkward to kick your foot out. This isn't a problem when doing a backside 180 heelflips (since you're closing off your shoulders to initiation the rotation), which is why those are more common.
I have a question. When I heelflip I can't seem to put my front foot back on. I flick and try to tuck but my front foot just cant seem to stay above my board. I can bring my backfoot on really well and I have the front foot only dialed. Does this just go down to practice and hours of repetition or do I seriously need to change something? ex: maybe my flick
Wow the part where you said, "Its like an ollie but with your heel" really clicked for me. I've been doing heelflips with my toe and kicking my foot out straight and up to the top corner pocket to get the board to spin. This always gives me a really hard time at landing them. I will definitely need to try it as you described, I also thought they were done the same you thought they were done originally too (but could never do it so resulted to the kicking motion).
I just learned how to heel flip 2 days ago. I'm 25. Started skating when I was 23. I landed my first heel flip and I was stoked...it was actually a decent heel flip, not some shitty heel flip that I barely managed and had to say IT COUNTS!!! after just to make myself feel legit. I think the thing that really helped me was learning to ollie really really well before I learned heel flips. I'm so stoked
I have a question. When I heelflip I can't seem to put my front foot back on. I flick and try to tuck but my front foot just cant seem to stay above my board. I can bring my backfoot on really well and I have the front foot only dialed. Does this just go down to practice and hours of repetition or do I seriously need to change something? ex: maybe my flick
@@Peppapig-nm7ob sounds like you’re flicking downward, which will cause the board to be pushed down toward the ground, this not giving your front foot any time to land on it. Your back foot probably can still land on it since it doesn’t have to flick and leave the board the way the front foot has to in order to get the rotation. The back foot literally starts over the board and just hovers there until it’s time to catch so it’s not a problem really for the back foot. How are your ollies? Because the way I think of a heel flip is the same way I think about an Ollie more or less. Granted for a heel flip it is diagonal to he toe side of your board using your heel but for me, I literally keep my foot forward like an Ollie but just drag it diagonally while keeping it faced forward as if it were still on the board. Basically it’s a diagonal slide off of the board, not just shoving your foot in that direction and hoping it ‘hits’ the corner, it actually needs to OLLIE off of the corner of that makes sense. But yes that’s my opinion, more than likely you are flicking downward thus not giving your heel flip enough hang time in the air for your front foot to find the board again and come back on it. Increase your hang time by ollieing your heel flip not just kicking it. I hope that makes sense but the truth is heel flip is a difficult trick for some people. Kick flips are difficult for me, even though they are the same trick I have excellent heel flips yet I have never learned to kick flip.
@@daft_wizard I can jump a board on its side without warm up and jump a three stair. Should I change my front foot positioning? Also is there a way for me to show you footage?
@@Peppapig-nm7ob the best thing I can tell you is A) have your ollies down well. If you can’t Ollie into a box every try, you aren’t really ready to be learning heel flips. It feels to me when I do a heel flips as if I do an Ollie-slide with my front foot and then very quickly kick out diagnonally, so almost think of it as an Ollie-late heel flip if that makes sense.
One thing you didn't mention is that a common problem in learning heels is that the board can land behind you a lot. When I learned them, the thing that made them "click" was that I consciously jumped slightly backwards. That, and I barely hang my front toes off the board.
I rolled my ankle a couple of years ago on a heelflip and have had the bad habit of jumping forwards since then. It's rare that I can land a good heelflip, but when the ingredients for the trick are right I'll do one perfectly. I used to have my toes hanging off the board at first, but I saw my friend blast his heelflips over the hip at the skatepark and his foot was still in the ollie position. It made my heelflips that much better because I was much more comfortable in that foot position.
I have a question. When I heelflip I can't seem to put my front foot back on. I flick and try to tuck but my front foot just cant seem to stay above my board. I can bring my backfoot on really well and I have the front foot only dialed. Does this just go down to practice and hours of repetition or do I seriously need to change something? ex: maybe my flick
@@Peppapig-nm7ob don’t know if you solved this yet but mind your shoulders, perhaps you’re throwing one in front of the other and your feet are mimicking that
I love the musing at the end of the video, hope you continue to do them in more of your videos. I feel there is a lack of "sports science" and Kinesthetics in skateboarding, incorporating more of that into our sessions would help skateboarders progress at a much faster rate as opposed to battling a trick for months or years.
Companies and the culture itself doesn't want it. Brands have made up their image through years so if technique comes to skateboarding they would lose money as fuck. Imagine a Thrasher guy saying 'wait, I need to stretch properly after my sessions and drink lots of water bc otherwise tomorrow my legs will hurt as fuck' instead of going for the beers and partying hahah. Hopefully it is slowly changing with all the street league and contest culture (which I don't really support at all) and guys go to the gym and get fit. Nyjah or Luan are strong as hell as an example
Appreciate the straight forward lesson Ben. & you earned a few points with the prarie folks for skating outside. Great vid as per , the audio has come along nicely. Cheers and happy new year to you and your family.
Hi Cliff. It couldn't have been more than a degree or two below zero so I look tougher than I am. I agree about the audio. So clear that the squeaky trucks will drive everyone crazy! I'm going to try and solve that problem tomorrow. Happy New Year to you as well.🎉
Bens skate vids are the best, down to earth. As a 90s skater being 40 and getting into slides and having pressure flips and shoves without the pop down, I needed to see this heel vid
Came back to comment and thank you ! I've hated messing with my hdelfilps for like 15 years I landed a few and threw them in the trick bag never mastering or throwing style with it...... until you simply said OLLIE WITH YOUR HEEL! 1st try no BS was a structured heel flip , 1st try fakie heel bang! What the hell , 4 simple words change my heel game for life . Thank you so much man . So glad I was like the hell with it I'll watch the video my heels are garbage,, now I feel like it's a new fav
These are definitely on my list of tricks to get back, love the look and feel of a nice clean heel! Really enjoying your videos after discovering last week, I'm 39 and getting back into it now my eldest is obsessed with skating.
Damn now I feel bad for using the “there’s snow outside” excuse for not skating yet you’re here doing how to heel flip videos 😂 maybe tomorrow ..... Happy new year!!! 🎉🎊
Dude... I just found your channel and you are def killin it. You are teaching and covering a lot of very interesting content. I studied anatomy and physiology and lots of sciences and i agree about the switch heel. I think we may very well have stonger muscles on our pushing/popping foot and that very well could be why switch heels come easier for some. (Not This guy tho) But it is true.... i know dudes who can barely front 180, but they have switch heel on lock.
For some reason I was always better at heelflips than kick flips. Mainly for the reason that is stated in the video. You are always over the board when you heel than when you kick flip. Great video.
Big fan from Old Mexico ... the heelflip is overlooked in comparisson to the kickflip cuz is harder to understand and appreciate the flip. I learned the heel right after kickflips like you said but they feel great when you catch them perfectly. Switch heels are popular cuz the flip is easier than a switch kickflip ...or nollie kickflip. Well ...thats my opinion... Thanks for the vids and keep skating.
Honestly I always thought it's because the stance and not the strengh of the ankle. I'm not saying that your theory is wrong, I just had this other perspective through out my whole life. Because when you'r riding switch, you tend to be more lean back, to be more above your back foot and somehow, in my mind, that makes the biggest difference when riding switch. :) But that's just me! It's always nice to see other perspectives on things!
Hi, Ben, Just wanted to say those are some really nice heel flips! I am a beginner and am learning my first flip trick after having learned to ollie, FS 180 and pop shuvit. I started learning to heel flip first bc I could sort of get the board to spin whereas with the kick flip I would just fall over or shoot the board away. I found it really interesting about how you said the heel flip is less versatile, I never thought about it like that. Anyway nice video, I always enjoy your stuff.
Nice video. About the switch thing, I think it has something to do with the way your shoulders and feet are slightly different setup for switch heelflips and regular. When I'm setting up for switch I feel way more stable on my feet and therefore more confident than a regular heelflip.
I am still learning this one... after my pause, this was the first trick i relearned after some shove its but after switching from my 8 years old 7.625" to an 8" deck I just can't do them well anymore :-| the switch heelflip talk is funny. I was never really able to do ANY flip tricks consistently but then I learned a nollie heel in about an hour (never learned ANYTHING that fast ever) and I could pull it off almost every try. and then suddenly learned switch heel flips and regular ones and some fakie variations. really funny how things can go. ... now I have to relearn everything again >.< :D
I've been able to do heelflips since late 91 , I rolled my ankle doing a kickflip down a set of stairs at my then local primary school, and found after a few weeks before my ankle healed fully that keeping it square I could heelflip. Ever since I have had them down ,and I even learnt to kickflip & 360° flip with my front foot in a standard ollie position due to my ankle. So for me, they've always been a better trick that I could pop higher & do smoother than kickflips.
You’re heelflips are beautiful. It was the first trick I learned after Ollie and then I learned double heels. Still suck at Kickflip. But that’s my goal this summer. I live in Ontario and it’s nasty snowy so I can’t skate til the spring I’m bingeing on skate vids lol.
I think it may also be related to what foot you kick with. I skate regular and feel most comfortable kicking a soccer ball with my left foot, so that makes me more comfortable at regular heel flips.
Another possibility is that our back feet are less nimble and less used to the kickflip flicking motion that our front foot is used to, therefore we keep our feet more parallel to the ground and leaves a more stable surface for our boards to bounce off of. For example, when we use our front foot to flip a heel flip, our ankles may snap and flick way too much and thus avoids hitting the board as much as when we use our back (stiff) foot/ankle.
The one trick that i hated learning. I always credit card myself all the time trying learning heelflip that i've fully decided to shy away from this trick. Thanks Ben, going to use these tips to learn and get it down.
"credit card" heels come if you can't get flick. One of two reasons...foot position too close or too much toe over board. My front foot toe does not hang over board at all.
Fakie is the way to go. Don't know why, but it works. I learned heelflips before kickflips because it seemed that kicking out was easier to me. Learned them after three tries and kickflips took a couple months.
You really do a crispy/great heelflip my friend! Great job. I have a question.....i push mongo, do i think i could/should start practicing pushing regular? Lol and what is so damnn bad about it??
People hate on mongo because it is not the norm. It's as simple as that. In term's of ergonomics it's a less efficient way to push because you have to change the position of your body in between standing and pushing which is the only pragmatic reason to change. I wouldn't get worked up about it. One of my best friends is a lifelong mongo pusher. You could work on correcting it but it does take time.
I'm more of a heelfliper, I prefer them than kickflips and I make a lot of people regret not practicing them in games of skate, works most of the time! Nice video Ben!
i like your tutorial video, can u update more? its really helpful which i can get new opinions. btw do u think whether the goofy skater can do a kickflip easier then regular cuz their right leg have more mucsle
Have had kick flips for about 10 months. Just starting to learn heel flips. Seems to flip behind me and not underneath me. Much practice to come.......
Heelflips were the first flip trick I ever landed. On a 9-1/4 in the early 90s no less. That said, I paralyzed my back ankle for a few months when I tripped on something while walking in the dark so I found myself doing a lot of switch and nollie heelflip trips. My theory is that the back foot is so stiff that it has more power for the heelflip. Likewise, we are already used to slightly rolling then dragging our front ankles due to the ollie and kickflip that it does not have the same stiffness for heelflips. That is my theory at least.
These might be the best heelflip shoes I have ever had. Something about the shape of the sole grips the board and throws them up to my feet. I'm sure it's the shoes.
The reason is that the right foot is for most people the strong foot (does not matter if they ride regular or goofy). And with the strong foot you have a better feeling for flicking than with your weaker foot.
I am 37 years old and just getting back into skating after 2 years off When I'm well-practiced heelflips switch heelflips nollie heelflip and so on come very easy to me kickflip frontside flip Tre flip not so much
the night and day difference with heelflips is which foot you put weight on. if youre riding regular and put the weight on your back foot it will be harder to land a heelflip- possible sure, but harder than it needs to be. if youre riding regular and put the weight on your FRONT foot before/during the flick, youll have a much better time. this is why some are better at switch heelflips. they naturally want to put the weight on their back foot (which is now front foot since were riding switch) and in turn gives them a better heelflip.
some will say shoulders or the muscles in your dominant leg etc. but go try a heelflip while leaning on your back foot, then try a heelflip leaning on your front foot. curious if this helps anyone
For the most part, I agree with you. But every so often you come across someone who by virtue of just being awesome does his heelflips better than 99.9 percent of skaters. Obviously I fall in that tenth percent. I will say getting your regular heelflips down and do them properly and your switch and nollie heelflips will get way better. I could do them for a few years before I decided I was over the worm burners and do them properly, and it's one of the most satisfying tricks. You can hear them smack the bottom of your feet.
Is trashing the backside of your shoe just an unfortunate circumstance of a heelflip? Or am I doing it wrong? I landed it a couple of times after i landed the kickflip but seem to be having issues ever since. I'm trying to avoid sliding the side of my shoe and focus more on making contact with the sole.
I grew up doing these so well. I had varial heels great, fakie fs heel and regular like ollies..now i'll be luck to get one out of 25...I think somehow I've changed the way i flick/roll my ankle when i do them. I feel like you have to be more precise.
Heelflips are so hard for me... I think i've landed 10 heelflips since april, versus a lot of kickflips. I can pop, flick (can we say "flick" for a heel ?), but my board is always behind me.
I love this video and I was thinking about the very same thing yesterday and one point that I think you forgot to mention is that generally when people Skate switch they pop with their nose and I don’t know if that has anything to do with people getting better at it but just something to note
@@binglebop5877 I see what you are saying but what we mean is that we are using the nose as the tail. So it’s still switch stance but the board itself is just backwards.
wanna know whats funny i never learned ollies first,...i learned heelflips first lol and i had them so clean,I heelflip Like Neen Williams like an ollie position idk why its just wierd how i learned to skate. Anyways Aswome video like always its helpful and straight to the point
Video ends me trying to remember why I stopped doing heel flips.... honestly not sure... but switch heels are about the same as a heel flip as far as in effort on flat ground. But switch gets harder off drops. ( I have way to much free time since I got injured skating. Always throwing my 2 cents in the comments and watching all the old vids.)
i also learned em switch first and wondered about what could be wrong with me, not even doing them regular. but when i decided to finally learn regular heels i made it first try und it kept going like that. but there still are other tricks that are easier for me to do switch like fs shuvs. regular? maybe 10 tries to land at least one. switch? first try with eese n steeze! it's interesting hoe different people learn stuff like that.
Everyone is different I guess. A heelflip is my go to trick. It's the flip trick I would use off things. However I suck at switch heelflips and find switch kickflips easier.
Hi,I am one of your fans,and I am from China,I am wondering if I could translate your videos into Chinese and put them in some Chinese websites?We will appreciate it if we got your authorization.
i dont get how you can slide your foot up the board like that, when i try to slide my whole foot i just end up sliding the tip/side if that makes sense. i just end up hurting my ankle
When trying to get my kickflip back I’m 33 years old and back at it again after watching you skate. I couldn’t do it standing still only rolling if I was stillnit would rocket and land with the nose straight up in the air lol I can’t pop good enough unless rolling it seems like to me .
I got it In the ass rocketing a heel flip down a 2 flat 2, I can heel flip, just dont anymore hahaha. That bail gave me heelflip ptsd. You're right tho. I put that trick in the bank so hard after that, wasnt even bad at them but that was enough for me not to want to risk it ever again. So I got really good at my switch and nollie. I can nollie and switch laser flip. Never in a million years land one reg. Maybe fakie lol.
Yea I'm permanently stuck goofy footed. I can only do front side or nolli stile tricks swich is to much of a disaster. No power in my right foot for popping.and less flick on my left foot.
I've been skating for 10 years and this spring when the snow melted I COULDN'T HEELFLIP ANYMORE!! I literally had no idea what was going wrong I've been skating long enough that I can usually self diagnose any issues, adjusting weight distribution, set-up, truck tightness, changing where/how I flick off and literally nothing made sense. Sometimes I could land them and other times I'd be totally hopeless. TODAY I FINALLY FIGURED IT OUT! WHEN LEANING BACK YOU MUST STICK YOUR REAR END OUT FURTHER TO GET MORE WEIGHT BEHIND THE BOARD! THIS ALSO HELPS YOU SEE THE BOARD ROTATE UNDER YOU! before I was literally bending straight down to pop and trying to lean my shoulders back which would put my head behind my knees so I could hardly see the board rotate as well and made you land with your weight way to far forward! Even if the board stayed under me and I jumped on it I'd fall forward when I landed. Pretty sure I'd occasionally do this with tre flips too but it wasn't such an issue because 360 flips rotate in front of you so my weight would more or less even out, but it felt like I was rotating them blindly which made it scarier to catch!
Switch heelflips are more popular because they look better. A lot more difficult to do a regular heelflip with good style. Usually people (you too ben) do them head long with their ass out. Does not look good.
![ปฏิเสธไม่ไหว (Crush on you) - LIPTA feat. No One Else [Official MV]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/NBw1jF342vw/mqdefault.jpg)
Thumbs up for skating when there's snow on the ground!
with your baby on the background
*every skater in Russia*
Lol that's something you have to just get used to here in Michigan... not to mention the winters do a number on our roads and other pavement so there's plenty of crust everywhere
Neen Williams make heelflips look like kickflips. Neen is probably has the best heelflips atm.
idk versaceplug's heel flip is pretty nice
Lay4jumper2 neen’s still looks like a heelflip, doesn’t look like a kickflip, another guy who does them perfectly is Kevin Rodrigues from converse.
Neen Williams heelflips look kinda silly to me. something about the way that he tweaks his back foot when catches.
finally checked him out after seeing so many gush about it. its ugly as hell lol
using tubes heel flips are beautiful and imo his is wonderful
Switch heelflips are easier because of the shoulder position that's inherent in stance. You know when someone is skating switch because their shoulders are parallel with the board and look 'closed off'. This makes it easier to move your flipping foot out in front of you. When skating your regular stance your chest is opened up toward the nose a bit and it's more awkward to kick your foot out. This isn't a problem when doing a backside 180 heelflips (since you're closing off your shoulders to initiation the rotation), which is why those are more common.
That makes sence it's tottaly true.
was just about to write that, i totally agree
great! agree 100%
I was gonna say that lol. Switch helps me fo bs grinds too.
I have a question. When I heelflip I can't seem to put my front foot back on. I flick and try to tuck but my front foot just cant seem to stay above my board. I can bring my backfoot on really well and I have the front foot only dialed. Does this just go down to practice and hours of repetition or do I seriously need to change something? ex: maybe my flick
"It's like an Ollie with the heel of your foot" This is the best advice I have ever gotten for heelflips
Wow the part where you said, "Its like an ollie but with your heel" really clicked for me. I've been doing heelflips with my toe and kicking my foot out straight and up to the top corner pocket to get the board to spin. This always gives me a really hard time at landing them. I will definitely need to try it as you described, I also thought they were done the same you thought they were done originally too (but could never do it so resulted to the kicking motion).
Was it the best tip?
I just learned how to heel flip 2 days ago. I'm 25. Started skating when I was 23. I landed my first heel flip and I was stoked...it was actually a decent heel flip, not some shitty heel flip that I barely managed and had to say IT COUNTS!!! after just to make myself feel legit. I think the thing that really helped me was learning to ollie really really well before I learned heel flips. I'm so stoked
I have a question. When I heelflip I can't seem to put my front foot back on. I flick and try to tuck but my front foot just cant seem to stay above my board. I can bring my backfoot on really well and I have the front foot only dialed. Does this just go down to practice and hours of repetition or do I seriously need to change something? ex: maybe my flick
@@Peppapig-nm7ob sounds like you’re flicking downward, which will cause the board to be pushed down toward the ground, this not giving your front foot any time to land on it. Your back foot probably can still land on it since it doesn’t have to flick and leave the board the way the front foot has to in order to get the rotation. The back foot literally starts over the board and just hovers there until it’s time to catch so it’s not a problem really for the back foot. How are your ollies? Because the way I think of a heel flip is the same way I think about an Ollie more or less. Granted for a heel flip it is diagonal to he toe side of your board using your heel but for me, I literally keep my foot forward like an Ollie but just drag it diagonally while keeping it faced forward as if it were still on the board. Basically it’s a diagonal slide off of the board, not just shoving your foot in that direction and hoping it ‘hits’ the corner, it actually needs to OLLIE off of the corner of that makes sense. But yes that’s my opinion, more than likely you are flicking downward thus not giving your heel flip enough hang time in the air for your front foot to find the board again and come back on it. Increase your hang time by ollieing your heel flip not just kicking it. I hope that makes sense but the truth is heel flip is a difficult trick for some people. Kick flips are difficult for me, even though they are the same trick I have excellent heel flips yet I have never learned to kick flip.
@@daft_wizard I can jump a board on its side without warm up and jump a three stair. Should I change my front foot positioning? Also is there a way for me to show you footage?
@@Peppapig-nm7ob the best thing I can tell you is A) have your ollies down well. If you can’t Ollie into a box every try, you aren’t really ready to be learning heel flips. It feels to me when I do a heel flips as if I do an Ollie-slide with my front foot and then very quickly kick out diagnonally, so almost think of it as an Ollie-late heel flip if that makes sense.
One thing you didn't mention is that a common problem in learning heels is that the board can land behind you a lot. When I learned them, the thing that made them "click" was that I consciously jumped slightly backwards. That, and I barely hang my front toes off the board.
I do mine exactly the same way i ollie as well, the foot position just gives a cleaner looking better flick
I rolled my ankle a couple of years ago on a heelflip and have had the bad habit of jumping forwards since then. It's rare that I can land a good heelflip, but when the ingredients for the trick are right I'll do one perfectly. I used to have my toes hanging off the board at first, but I saw my friend blast his heelflips over the hip at the skatepark and his foot was still in the ollie position. It made my heelflips that much better because I was much more comfortable in that foot position.
I have a question. When I heelflip I can't seem to put my front foot back on. I flick and try to tuck but my front foot just cant seem to stay above my board. I can bring my backfoot on really well and I have the front foot only dialed. Does this just go down to practice and hours of repetition or do I seriously need to change something? ex: maybe my flick
@@Peppapig-nm7ob don’t know if you solved this yet but mind your shoulders, perhaps you’re throwing one in front of the other and your feet are mimicking that
I love the musing at the end of the video, hope you continue to do them in more of your videos. I feel there is a lack of "sports science" and Kinesthetics in skateboarding, incorporating more of that into our sessions would help skateboarders progress at a much faster rate as opposed to battling a trick for months or years.
Companies and the culture itself doesn't want it. Brands have made up their image through years so if technique comes to skateboarding they would lose money as fuck. Imagine a Thrasher guy saying 'wait, I need to stretch properly after my sessions and drink lots of water bc otherwise tomorrow my legs will hurt as fuck' instead of going for the beers and partying hahah. Hopefully it is slowly changing with all the street league and contest culture (which I don't really support at all) and guys go to the gym and get fit. Nyjah or Luan are strong as hell as an example
This is the best how to skate video ive seen. Entertaining and explained clearly. Great work man.
Appreciate the straight forward lesson Ben. & you earned a few points with the prarie folks for skating outside. Great vid as per , the audio has come along nicely. Cheers and happy new year to you and your family.
Hi Cliff. It couldn't have been more than a degree or two below zero so I look tougher than I am. I agree about the audio. So clear that the squeaky trucks will drive everyone crazy! I'm going to try and solve that problem tomorrow. Happy New Year to you as well.🎉
Bens skate vids are the best, down to earth. As a 90s skater being 40 and getting into slides and having pressure flips and shoves without the pop down, I needed to see this heel vid
Came back to comment and thank you ! I've hated messing with my hdelfilps for like 15 years I landed a few and threw them in the trick bag never mastering or throwing style with it...... until you simply said OLLIE WITH YOUR HEEL! 1st try no BS was a structured heel flip , 1st try fakie heel bang! What the hell , 4 simple words change my heel game for life . Thank you so much man . So glad I was like the hell with it I'll watch the video my heels are garbage,, now I feel like it's a new fav
These are definitely on my list of tricks to get back, love the look and feel of a nice clean heel!
Really enjoying your videos after discovering last week, I'm 39 and getting back into it now my eldest is obsessed with skating.
Damn now I feel bad for using the “there’s snow outside” excuse for not skating yet you’re here doing how to heel flip videos 😂 maybe tomorrow .....
Happy new year!!! 🎉🎊
You have the most beautiful heelflips in the world Ben. I’m committed to learning this trick.
Dude... I just found your channel and you are def killin it. You are teaching and covering a lot of very interesting content. I studied anatomy and physiology and lots of sciences and i agree about the switch heel. I think we may very well have stonger muscles on our pushing/popping foot and that very well could be why switch heels come easier for some. (Not This guy tho) But it is true.... i know dudes who can barely front 180, but they have switch heel on lock.
Thank you Ben! I landed my first heelflip with this. Hi from Argentina
For some reason I was always better at heelflips than kick flips. Mainly for the reason that is stated in the video. You are always over the board when you heel than when you kick flip. Great video.
hey Ben, I've watched a lot of your tutorials and let me congratulate you because it's the best skateboarding channel on youtube ! all the best
Ovidiu Dan you are too kind, but thank you. I will try to get to some more tutorials soon.
Awesome video, as always, gotta learn the heelflip and the kickflip, this is my new year resolution.
Happy new year from Italy.
Big fan from Old Mexico ... the heelflip is overlooked in comparisson to the kickflip cuz is harder to understand and appreciate the flip. I learned the heel right after kickflips like you said but they feel great when you catch them perfectly. Switch heels are popular cuz the flip is easier than a switch kickflip ...or nollie kickflip. Well ...thats my opinion... Thanks for the vids and keep skating.
Honestly I always thought it's because the stance and not the strengh of the ankle. I'm not saying that your theory is wrong, I just had this other perspective through out my whole life. Because when you'r riding switch, you tend to be more lean back, to be more above your back foot and somehow, in my mind, that makes the biggest difference when riding switch. :) But that's just me! It's always nice to see other perspectives on things!
Good theory. Then maybe pushing switch more will improve regular heelflips?
Love rewatching these man, they're so useful
Hi, Ben,
Just wanted to say those are some really nice heel flips! I am a beginner and am learning my first flip trick after having learned to ollie, FS 180 and pop shuvit. I started learning to heel flip first bc I could sort of get the board to spin whereas with the kick flip I would just fall over or shoot the board away. I found it really interesting about how you said the heel flip is less versatile, I never thought about it like that. Anyway nice video, I always enjoy your stuff.
Nice video. About the switch thing, I think it has something to do with the way your shoulders and feet are slightly different setup for switch heelflips and regular. When I'm setting up for switch I feel way more stable on my feet and therefore more confident than a regular heelflip.
I am still learning this one... after my pause, this was the first trick i relearned after some shove its but
after switching from my 8 years old 7.625" to an 8" deck I just can't do them well anymore :-|
the switch heelflip talk is funny. I was never really able to do ANY flip tricks consistently
but then I learned a nollie heel in about an hour (never learned ANYTHING that fast ever) and I could pull it off almost every try.
and then suddenly learned switch heel flips and regular ones and some fakie variations. really funny how things can go.
... now I have to relearn everything again >.<
:D
I've been able to do heelflips since late 91 ,
I rolled my ankle doing a kickflip down a set of stairs at my then local primary school, and found after a few weeks before my ankle healed fully that keeping it square I could heelflip.
Ever since I have had them down ,and I even learnt to kickflip & 360° flip with my front foot in a standard ollie position due to my ankle.
So for me, they've always been a better trick that I could pop higher & do smoother than kickflips.
You’re heelflips are beautiful. It was the first trick I learned after Ollie and then I learned double heels. Still suck at
Kickflip. But that’s my goal this summer. I live in Ontario and it’s nasty snowy so I can’t skate til the spring I’m bingeing on skate vids lol.
I think it may also be related to what foot you kick with. I skate regular and feel most comfortable kicking a soccer ball with my left foot, so that makes me more comfortable at regular heel flips.
Another possibility is that our back feet are less nimble and less used to the kickflip flicking motion that our front foot is used to, therefore we keep our feet more parallel to the ground and leaves a more stable surface for our boards to bounce off of. For example, when we use our front foot to flip a heel flip, our ankles may snap and flick way too much and thus avoids hitting the board as much as when we use our back (stiff) foot/ankle.
The one trick that i hated learning. I always credit card myself all the time trying learning heelflip that i've fully decided to shy away from this trick. Thanks Ben, going to use these tips to learn and get it down.
I have a good story about my brother getting credit carded back when he was a wee tot. His feet were off the ground!
"credit card" heels come if you can't get flick. One of two reasons...foot position too close or too much toe over board. My front foot toe does not hang over board at all.
Fakie is the way to go. Don't know why, but it works. I learned heelflips before kickflips because it seemed that kicking out was easier to me. Learned them after three tries and kickflips took a couple months.
heelflips look better than kickflips in my opinion
moonuve kid kick flips are over rated
No way! Kickflips all day :D
Tre flips
@@imelevated53 Laser flips
Forsaken Pixel Nagisa u right brodie
I love heelflips.
Glad to see that I'm not the only 30 something year old dude that still skates in front of my house.
You really do a crispy/great heelflip my friend! Great job. I have a question.....i push mongo, do i think i could/should start practicing pushing regular? Lol and what is so damnn bad about it??
People hate on mongo because it is not the norm. It's as simple as that. In term's of ergonomics it's a less efficient way to push because you have to change the position of your body in between standing and pushing which is the only pragmatic reason to change. I wouldn't get worked up about it. One of my best friends is a lifelong mongo pusher. You could work on correcting it but it does take time.
This was really helpful - many thanks for the heel flip advice.
I'm more of a heelfliper, I prefer them than kickflips and I make a lot of people regret not practicing them in games of skate, works most of the time! Nice video Ben!
You are a rare breed:)
I love watching your videos. Keep it up.
i like your tutorial video, can u update more? its really helpful which i can get new opinions. btw do u think whether the goofy skater can do a kickflip easier then regular cuz their right leg have more mucsle
Have had kick flips for about 10 months. Just starting to learn heel flips. Seems to flip behind me and not underneath me. Much practice to come.......
Heelflips were the first flip trick I ever landed. On a 9-1/4 in the early 90s no less. That said, I paralyzed my back ankle for a few months when I tripped on something while walking in the dark so I found myself doing a lot of switch and nollie heelflip trips. My theory is that the back foot is so stiff that it has more power for the heelflip. Likewise, we are already used to slightly rolling then dragging our front ankles due to the ollie and kickflip that it does not have the same stiffness for heelflips. That is my theory at least.
that makes way more sens to me ! now i can do the full rotation :) thanks to you
Awesome!!
Your cool with me reg heelflips but as soon as I learn you switch I’m gone! Nice shoes Ben! I just had a pair same color.. as always sick video
These might be the best heelflip shoes I have ever had. Something about the shape of the sole grips the board and throws them up to my feet. I'm sure it's the shoes.
Ben Degros lol gotta be the shoes!
The reason is that the right foot is for most people the strong foot (does not matter if they ride regular or goofy). And with the strong foot you have a better feeling for flicking than with your weaker foot.
I just like hearing you talk its almost soothing
I am 37 years old and just getting back into skating after 2 years off When I'm well-practiced heelflips switch heelflips nollie heelflip and so on come very easy to me kickflip frontside flip Tre flip not so much
I love heelflips too:)
Great videos btw!
It's amazing that some skaters say you have to kick with your pinkie and some that you have to kick with your heel.
Ben is a Excellent Teacher!!!
Another awesome video! Keep it up!
the night and day difference with heelflips is which foot you put weight on. if youre riding regular and put the weight on your back foot it will be harder to land a heelflip- possible sure, but harder than it needs to be. if youre riding regular and put the weight on your FRONT foot before/during the flick, youll have a much better time. this is why some are better at switch heelflips. they naturally want to put the weight on their back foot (which is now front foot since were riding switch) and in turn gives them a better heelflip.
some will say shoulders or the muscles in your dominant leg etc. but go try a heelflip while leaning on your back foot, then try a heelflip leaning on your front foot.
curious if this helps anyone
I can’t get the motion of kickflips but heelflips feels natural as fuc
Damn same, heelflips feel so natural but kickflip is just to hard
For the most part, I agree with you. But every so often you come across someone who by virtue of just being awesome does his heelflips better than 99.9 percent of skaters. Obviously I fall in that tenth percent. I will say getting your regular heelflips down and do them properly and your switch and nollie heelflips will get way better. I could do them for a few years before I decided I was over the worm burners and do them properly, and it's one of the most satisfying tricks. You can hear them smack the bottom of your feet.
Is trashing the backside of your shoe just an unfortunate circumstance of a heelflip? Or am I doing it wrong? I landed it a couple of times after i landed the kickflip but seem to be having issues ever since. I'm trying to avoid sliding the side of my shoe and focus more on making contact with the sole.
2:46 I never realized that's why I learned heelflips before kickflips
...about 20 years ago. F me I'm old
I have heels on lock but can't kickflip to save myself
Same here
Thats how i started out, heels first. Keep trying!
If Eric Foreman were a skateboarder
good point!! my switch heels are much better than the normal ones, i even feel more comfortable^^
I grew up doing these so well. I had varial heels great, fakie fs heel and regular like ollies..now i'll be luck to get one out of 25...I think somehow I've changed the way i flick/roll my ankle when i do them. I feel like you have to be more precise.
Heelflips are so hard for me... I think i've landed 10 heelflips since april, versus a lot of kickflips. I can pop, flick (can we say "flick" for a heel ?), but my board is always behind me.
I think flick applies to both.
I love this video and I was thinking about the very same thing yesterday and one point that I think you forgot to mention is that generally when people Skate switch they pop with their nose and I don’t know if that has anything to do with people getting better at it but just something to note
I think it’s easier to heelflip regular when popping off of the nose, for sure
If someone is skating switch but popping off the nose isnt that just fakie lol
@@binglebop5877 I see what you are saying but what we mean is that we are using the nose as the tail. So it’s still switch stance but the board itself is just backwards.
You kick forward towards where your toes point or up towards the nose and side type of kick just beyond the nose.
I already know how to do heels on 4rs, but i enjoyed for real that skate wondering about switch heels!
wanna know whats funny i never learned ollies first,...i learned heelflips first lol and i had them so clean,I heelflip Like Neen Williams like an ollie position idk why its just wierd how i learned to skate. Anyways Aswome video like always its helpful and straight to the point
Video ends me trying to remember why I stopped doing heel flips.... honestly not sure... but switch heels are about the same as a heel flip as far as in effort on flat ground. But switch gets harder off drops. ( I have way to much free time since I got injured skating. Always throwing my 2 cents in the comments and watching all the old vids.)
i also learned em switch first and wondered about what could be wrong with me, not even doing them regular. but when i decided to finally learn regular heels i made it first try und it kept going like that. but there still are other tricks that are easier for me to do switch like fs shuvs. regular? maybe 10 tries to land at least one. switch? first try with eese n steeze! it's interesting hoe different people learn stuff like that.
Everyone is different I guess. A heelflip is my go to trick. It's the flip trick I would use off things. However I suck at switch heelflips and find switch kickflips easier.
Same bro it's weird I landed switch kickflip before regular. It just made sense lol our brains are trippy man
Personally I like the look and feel of heelflips more. Also please make a how to tre flip, I've been working on them for a while.
I'm not very good at them. I would feel like an imposter.
Ben Degros 😂
Hi,I am one of your fans,and I am from China,I am wondering if I could translate your videos into Chinese and put them in some Chinese websites?We will appreciate it if we got your authorization.
i dont get how you can slide your foot up the board like that, when i try to slide my whole foot i just end up sliding the tip/side if that makes sense. i just end up hurting my ankle
When trying to get my kickflip back I’m 33 years old and back at it again after watching you skate. I couldn’t do it standing still only rolling if I was stillnit would rocket and land with the nose straight up in the air lol I can’t pop good enough unless rolling it seems like to me .
Steezy as hell
i've learnt tre flips but still cant get heelflips. next time i skate ima try some and hopefully land one :)
I got it In the ass rocketing a heel flip down a 2 flat 2, I can heel flip, just dont anymore hahaha. That bail gave me heelflip ptsd. You're right tho. I put that trick in the bank so hard after that, wasnt even bad at them but that was enough for me not to want to risk it ever again. So I got really good at my switch and nollie. I can nollie and switch laser flip. Never in a million years land one reg. Maybe fakie lol.
Neeno has the best heel flips of all time
If we're going all time Lindsey Robertson might have him beat
Troubleshooting: As I heelflip the board rotate 90 degrees to my left. (Stance is not open, rather a bit closed). Any suggestions?
Henrik Larsson you are not popping straight down or you open your shoulders when popping
Did u have all these flat ground tricks as a kid or did you learn later?
I land on my heels or the board is behind me a bit, how do I fix this. Please help you got a nice heel too bro
Yeah I don't do many heel flips in general, but switch heels have always seemed easier 🤷♂️
Is that your baby in the background. So gangsta.
Yea I'm permanently stuck goofy footed. I can only do front side or nolli stile tricks swich is to much of a disaster. No power in my right foot for popping.and less flick on my left foot.
Left for pop right for kick
😅
dam ben amazing video
Are those the gt nikes??
I've been skating for 10 years and this spring when the snow melted I COULDN'T HEELFLIP ANYMORE!! I literally had no idea what was going wrong I've been skating long enough that I can usually self diagnose any issues, adjusting weight distribution, set-up, truck tightness, changing where/how I flick off and literally nothing made sense. Sometimes I could land them and other times I'd be totally hopeless. TODAY I FINALLY FIGURED IT OUT! WHEN LEANING BACK YOU MUST STICK YOUR REAR END OUT FURTHER TO GET MORE WEIGHT BEHIND THE BOARD! THIS ALSO HELPS YOU SEE THE BOARD ROTATE UNDER YOU! before I was literally bending straight down to pop and trying to lean my shoulders back which would put my head behind my knees so I could hardly see the board rotate as well and made you land with your weight way to far forward! Even if the board stayed under me and I jumped on it I'd fall forward when I landed. Pretty sure I'd occasionally do this with tre flips too but it wasn't such an issue because 360 flips rotate in front of you so my weight would more or less even out, but it felt like I was rotating them blindly which made it scarier to catch!
Make a video about varials
Whenever I stop doing heelflips and start doing kickflips, the board spins 180
My heelflip foot position is same as ollie. They feel more natural for me and I can pop them realy high.
Im a freestyle skateboarder and I can’t do kickflip to rail. I usually do heel flip to rail (which ends up toe-side)
fakie backside heel was ultra steeze ben
Your neighbourhood looks nice...
Your tottaly right switch heel my foot naturally flicks forward. Although popping and timing is alot harder cuase it's switch.
ive got the rotation down but i can never seem to land them
Bro same I landed one yesterday after that couldn’t land it again heelflips are so much easier than Kickflips for me
So greatful for thsi
For some reason i can backside heelflip like a boss but my regular heelflip looks wacky asf. Skateboarding is the most mysterious sport
I can almost land switch heel, cant get my back foot to do a kickflip
Why is there an inward heelflip but no “outward” kickflips
Hardflip
Switch heelflips are more popular because they look better. A lot more difficult to do a regular heelflip with good style. Usually people (you too ben) do them head long with their ass out. Does not look good.
where do i get the hoodie
It's about 3 years old. I'm not sure if you will find one still.
@bendegros are you Canadian?
Yes.