"Jump Straight Up"

[oak leaf]

this is the advice people give for all kinds of pop-based tricks.  when i was a little kid i would literally jump straight up, but i was also skating at like 0mph so it made sense to me.  once i started working on ledges specifically, i realized a jump forward (direction of the board, not forward with relation to my body) was critical in leveling out the ollie and also bringing the board with you onto stuff. 

to me, though, that's not a "jump straight up" its a diagonal at best.



when you ollie, kickflip, heelflip- any straight pop trick - what % of your jump is "Straight Up" (red arrow) and what % of your jump is "ahead of you" (green arrow) ?

im starting to wonder if difficulty i have with particular tricks/pop timing is a result of me jumping in a weird way.  no wrong answers, just curious how yall think about it

[kook1234]

when I remind myself to "jump straight up" I tend to start landing whatever flip trick im trying (that I can already do).  I never film myself but it feels like im doing it with better style too

[Urtripping]

Can't really put a number to it, but "jumping forward" has definitely helped with ollie based flatground tricks, and ESPECIALLY so with ledge skating. The jump forward helps you maintain your momentum when trying to hold grinds and slides in my experience.

Obviously jumping up higher and tucking knees higher gets things popped higher, but as far as actually performing tricks I'd say thinking about jumping forward is good advice.