A Contemporary Sport

In the last few decades, skateboarding has grown into a multi-billion dollar industry impacting millions of lives across the world as an art form and a sport. Starting in the 1950s, skateboarding was born in California when bored surfers wanted something to do when the waves were flat. This was dubbed "sidewalk surfing" – a new wave of surfing on the sidewalk. Because of this, early skaters emulated surfing style and maneuvers and performed barefoot.

The first manufactured skateboards were ordered by a Los Angeles surf shop, meant to be used by surfers in their downtime. By the 1960s a small number of surfing manufacturers in Southern California started building skateboards that resembled small surfboards and assembled teams to promote their products. Since then, skateboarding has expanded and evolved to become an international sport.

Types of Skateboarding

Freestyle

Freestyle skateboarding is the oldest style of skateboarding, dating back to the 1950s and 60s. Often a freestyler will need little more than a board and a smooth, flat surface. Professional freestyle competitions often involved music and choreography and focused on fluidity and technical skill. In the 1960s, many freestyle tricks were derived from gymnastics and dancing. The style changed significantly with the introduction of ollies and other tricks in the 1980s and the introduction of various obstacle elements.

Street

Modern street-style skateboarding was born during the late 1980s and early 1990s as an evolution of freestyle skateboarding. Skaters would opt for urban areas to skate as opposed to skate parks and ramps. They would use urban obstacles like stairs and their handrails, planter boxes, drainage ditches, park benches, and other street furniture to perform tricks around, on, onto, or over. A new style of skateboard deck, which had a kicktail at each end, became popular because of this change.

Vert

Vert-style skateboarding began in the 1970s in Santa Monica CA. The area, known as Dogtown by locals, was home to the Zephyr skateboard team (also known as the Z-Boys). When drought hit Southern California in 1976, the group saw this as an opportunity to try something new: they began taking skateboards into abandoned, dried-up swimming pools, creating a now-iconic image synonymous with their group. The Z-boys began riding the walls of pools, eventually over the rails, making them the first documented skateboarders to catch air. The young community outcasts sparked a small revolution in their impoverished beach town, and vert-style skating was born. Later on, the Vert Ramp became popular and skaters like Christian Hosoi, Tony Hawk, and Eliot Sloan emerged from this style of skating.

Park

The first skate parks emerged in the 1970s when skateboarders would flock and skateboard in such urban places as the Escondido reservoir in San Diego, California. Skateboarding magazines would publish different locations and skateboarders made up nicknames for each location such as the Tea Bowl, the Fruit Bowl, Bellagio, the Rabbit Hole, Bird Bath, the Egg Bowl, Upland Pool, and the Sewer Slide. (Many modern skate park setups and ramps are based on these different locations.) Soon after, skate parks started popping up all over the US and the rest of the world. Park skateboarding encompasses a variety of sub-styles. Most skate parks combine half pipes and quarter pipes with various other "vert" skateboarding features as well as "street" obstacles such as stairs, ledges, and rails. The integration of these elements produces a different skating experience.

Cruising

Cruising is a style similar to freestyle skateboarding but without any tricks. Cruising can be achieved with any type of skateboard. Skateboarders often use "cruisers" for this type of skateboarding, which are generally wider and have rubbery wheels. Most of these cruisers are shaped like surfboards, and resemble early skateboards. Cruising (similar to downhill skateboarding) is often used for transportation.

Downhill

Downhill skateboarding is one of the oldest styles of skateboarding and was popular in the early 1970s. This style uses longboards as opposed to normal skateboards. These are characterized by longer decks and wheelbases, larger-diameter and softer (lower-durometer) wheels, and often lower riding height compared to street skateboards. Downhill focuses on the descent of steep road grades at speed using methods such as sliding and foot braking to slow down for corners. This is usually done with the assistance of gloves with slide pucks as a point of stability. It features speeds faster than one can push, generally between 20 miles per hour and 80 miles per hour. Modern riders often use longboards for races, but some use regular skateboards for non-competition downhill skateboarding and transportation.