The Science Behind an Ollie

“Skateboarding is hard,” WIRED author Aatish Bhatia concedes in the opener of his newest piece. While the athletics of skateboarding – for all the muscle memory involved – might not be for everyone, Bhatia has broken down the physics of its most fundamental maneuver for all to understand. Through the use of a physics analysis tool called Tracker, the article first tracks the center of mass of the skateboard in the air, aptly comparing the up-and-down motion (a parabola, if you will) to that of a flying soccer ball. From here, Bhatia asserts that skateboarding is fundamentally different in the control exercised while in the air, then attributes said control to the variation in force applied by both feet. For an in-depth breakdown on the science behind an ollie, head over to WIRED’s site for this fun piece.