Glossary

Leaving a ramp with both wheels off the ground, usually above the coping, then landing back in it. Almost every park trick is an air with something added.

A long inflatable mat for tumbling. The air inside gives extra bounce and a soft landing, so flicks and somersaults get practised on it before the hard floor.

A shape where your body curves backwards, chest open and back bent. It is the opposite of a dish, and the shape you pass through in a bridge or a walkover.

The gymnastics done on apparatus at the Olympics. Women compete on four (vault, bars, beam and floor) and men on six (floor, pommel horse, rings, vault, parallel bars and high bar).

One of the two ways to turn or approach an obstacle. Backside means your back faces the obstacle, or you spin so your back leads. The other way is frontside.

Jumping off or stepping away from the board, scooter or bike before a trick goes wrong. Bailing on purpose is a skill: it is how you avoid a proper crash.

A straight slope up from flat ground, rather than a curve. Easier than a ramp for first airs, drops and 180s. A wedge is a small, short bank.

Short for handlebars, on a scooter or a BMX. Bar tricks like bar spins and X-ups turn them while you ride. The grips are the rubber parts you hold.

A padded beam only 10 cm wide and 5 metres long, set 1.25 metres off the floor in competition. You walk, jump, turn and tumble along it, and a routine uses the whole length.

The hard push off your hands through your shoulders, like a shrug, the instant they touch the floor or the vault. A good block sends you higher and further. A firm foam shape is also called a block.

The bolts holding the trucks to a skateboard deck. Landing on the bolts means putting your feet directly over them, where the board is strongest and snaps least.

A dip of curved concrete with coping round the top, like an empty swimming pool. You carve round it carrying speed, with no flat bottom to stop on.

BMX bikes usually have a back brake, and some a front one. Covering it means keeping a finger on the lever ready. A bike with none fitted is brakeless.

An arched shape with your hands and feet flat on the floor and your tummy facing up. Walkovers and limbers pass through one.

Jumping both wheels off the ground at once with nothing to push off. On a scooter you pull the bars up; on a BMX the front lifts, then the back. The start of nearly everything.

Balancing high on your shoulders with your body straight and your toes pointing at the ceiling: a shoulder stand. On a bar, the same straight upside-down hang has the same name.

Turning in a long curve while you roll, leaning the whole way round instead of pivoting. It is how you get round a bowl and up a ramp at an angle.

Coming up short on a jump or gap, so your back wheel hits the edge of the landing instead of clearing it. Usually caused by slowing down on the run-up.

On bars, swinging your legs back and up from front support so your hips lift away from the bar, then return. It starts most bar skills, and the biggest casts reach handstand.

Getting your feet, or hands, back on the deck or handlebars after they have spun or flipped, so you land in control. On gymnastics bars, it is taking hold of the bar again after letting go. Most tricks live or die on the catch.

White magnesium carbonate powder rubbed on hands and feet. It soaks up sweat so you do not slip on the bars, rings or beam.

Going all the way round. On bars, a hip circle turns right round the bar with your hips kept close to it. On a pommel horse, a circle swings both legs together round the horse while your hands hold you up.

The strength work in a session, such as holds and leg lifts, that builds the muscle tricks need. Squads do more of it than recreational classes.

The round metal or concrete edge along the top of a ramp or bowl. Grinds, stalls and drop-ins all happen on it, and an air leaves from it.

The arms the pedals bolt to on a BMX. They turn the sprocket, the toothed ring that drives the chain. A crankflip spins them backwards in the air.

A thick, soft mat placed where you land off an apparatus, to cushion dismounts and falls.

It depends on the sport. On a scooter, the plate you stand on. On a skateboard, the wooden board itself. On a ramp or bowl, the flat platform on top where you wait and drop in from.

When a trick is so practised that you land it nearly every time without thinking. Tutorials tell you to have the easier tricks dialled before you stack them together.

A gently curved shape with your lower back pressed flat and your shoulders and legs lifted, body tight. Also called a hollow. It is the shape your body holds in handstands, swings and flight.

The skill you use to get off an apparatus at the end of a routine, from a jump off the beam to a somersault off the bar. On floor it is the last tumble.

A small exercise that practises one part of a trick on its own. Coaches use drills to build a trick in safe pieces before it is put together.

Starting a ramp from the top: tail or back wheel on the coping, then tipping forward and rolling down the transition. The first big commitment in park riding.

On a BMX, lifting the back wheel and balancing on the front one, usually by squeezing the front brake as you lean forward. A manual the other way up.

Rolling backwards in your normal stance, so the tail leads. Your feet do not change; only the direction does. Every fakie trick starts from rolling backwards.

Ordinary level ground with nothing to ride on. Flatground tricks, like manuals and kickflips, need no ramp or ledge at all. It is also the library's category name for them.

On a skateboard, the quick snap of your front foot off the edge of the nose that makes the board flip. On a scooter, the kick or wrist snap that starts a whip.

The time you spend in the air. A vault has two flights: the first from the springboard to your hands on the table, the second from the table to the landing.

The competition UK recreational gymnasts usually enter first: a floor routine and a vault, in levels by ability. Many clubs run a Floor and Vault group or squad.

Riding up a quarter pipe and landing on the deck at the top instead of dropping back in. A safe, slow way to learn spins and whips before doing them in the air.

A pit full of loose foam blocks. At a park there is a ramp into it; in a gym it sits under the bars or beam or at the end of a run. Where flips get tried before they get landed, because falling in costs nothing.

Jamming your front foot against the front tyre so the wheel stops dead and the back end lifts up. Done rolling slowly. It is the base of most front-wheel tricks.

Putting one foot down on the ground, a ramp deck or a wall for a moment in the middle of a trick, then pushing off it to get back on. A boneless is one.

The part that holds the front wheel and turns with the bars, on a scooter or a BMX. A foot jammed behind the forks against the tyre is a footjam.

The main body of a BMX bike. In a tailwhip, the frame is what spins round underneath you. The top tube is the bar under the seat that a can-can swings a leg over.

Your front foot is the one nearer the nose in your normal stance; the back foot is over the tail. Which foot is which depends on the stance you ride.

One of the two ways to turn or approach an obstacle. Frontside means your front, your chest, faces the obstacle, or you spin with your chest opening the way you are travelling.

A full 360 spin done from rolling fakie, landing rolling forwards. Named after skater Steve Caballero. A half cab is the same trick with half the spin.

A space you have to clear in one jump: a set of stairs, a hole, or the space between two ramps. Also the name of the trick that clears one.

Holding part of the board, scooter or bike with your hand while you are in the air. Indy, melon and seat grab are named by which hand grabs what.

Sliding along an edge on the hard parts of your ride: the trucks on a skateboard, the pegs on a scooter or BMX. The 50-50 is the basic grind.

The rough, sandpaper-like sheet stuck to the top of a scooter or skateboard deck so your shoes do not slip. Spotting it coming back round tells you a whip is nearly done.

Rolling fakie, then hopping a 180 so you land rolling forwards. Half of a full cab. All three sports use the name.

Leather straps worn on the hands for bars and rings. They help you hold on and protect your palms from rips.

A metal rail down the side of a set of stairs, so it slopes as you grind it. Not in this library at all: the copy says ledge or low rail on purpose.

When a truck or wheel catches on the coping as you come back into the ramp, stopping you dead and usually throwing you down the transition.

Spinning a 180 out of a grind by turning towards the ledge, so you turn away from what you can see. The other direction is easier, which is why this one gets the name.

The short tube at the front of a scooter that the bars and forks go through, holding the steering. A tailwhip spins the deck around it. Some riders say steering tube or stem.

Where two ramps meet at an angle, making a corner you can air across from one into the other. A channel is a gap cut between two transitions.

The men's single bar, 2.8 metres off the floor, for swings, giants and release moves. It is often called the high bar, which is also the name of the higher of the two uneven bars.

A ledge that runs down beside a set of stairs, so it slopes as you grind it.

The long, low skip step between your run and a round-off, a handspring or the springboard. It turns running speed into take-off.

A take-off ramp facing a landing ramp, with a flat top or a gap between them, built for airtime. A kicker is a small stand-alone take-off ramp.

The raised edge of a pavement. The cheapest obstacle there is: a drop, a low ledge and a gap in one. American copy spells it curb.

Lifting the front wheels by leaning on the tail and swinging the nose round to point a new way. How you steer on a board and turn at the top of a bank.

On bars, getting from hanging below the bar to support on top of it: toes to the bar, then a fast opening of the hips and a pull. UK schemes call it an upstart; kip is the US word.

A stretched body shape, legs straight and together and toes pointed. UK clubs usually call it straight or stretched; layout is the US word, used most for somersaults done straight.

A low, straight edge, usually a concrete block or a low wall, for grinds and slides. Low ledges are where most riders learn a 50-50.

The stretchy one-piece outfit gymnasts train and compete in. A biketard is a leotard with shorts built in.

Several tricks done one after another in a single run, without stopping or putting a foot down. Riders film lines, not just single tricks.

The very top edge of a ramp, bank or quarter pipe, where the transition ends. Lip tricks are stalls, rocks and grinds done right on it.

A beam set just off the floor, or lying flat on it, where beam skills are learned safely before they move up to the high beam.

Standing with your front knee bent and your back leg straight behind you. Handstands, cartwheels and round-offs start from a lunge.

Rolling along balanced on the back wheels with the front lifted, without pedalling or pushing. A nose manual is the same on the front. Manuals are measured in distance.

Describes a ramp or transition with a gentle curve rather than a steep one. Mellow ramps are easier to learn on; steep ones give more pop.

The skill you use to get onto the beam or the bars at the start of a routine, often off a springboard.

A padded round dome on a low stand, used to learn pommel horse circles before the real horse. In the US, younger boys compete on one.

An ollie or hop popped off the nose instead of the tail, while rolling forwards. Short for nose ollie. On a BMX, the back wheel comes up first.

The front end of a skateboard, scooter deck or bike. Nose tricks, like nose manuals and nosegrinds, balance on the front. The other end is the tail.

The basic skateboard jump: snap the tail down, drag the front foot up, and the board leaves the ground with you. Everything else in skateboarding is built on it.

A session where you use the club's equipment to practise what you like instead of following a class. Staff supervise, but it is not coached, and it usually has to be booked.

Being thrown forward over the handlebars when the front wheel stops or dips on landing. The crash scooter and BMX riders most want to avoid.

A men's apparatus: two bars side by side, 2 metres off the floor. You swing and balance between and above them, holding yourself up on straight arms.

Short for skatepark, and the library's category for tricks on ramps, bowls and jump boxes. Park riding is about airtime; street riding is about ledges and rails.

Short metal tubes bolted beside the wheels of a scooter or BMX so you can grind ledges and rails on them. Not fitted as standard, and some grinds need them.

A shape folded forward at the hips with your legs straight and together.

Turning on one wheel or one truck without hopping, so the rest of the ride swings round it. A rollback and a pivot to fakie are both pivots.

A men's apparatus: a padded horse 1.15 metres high with two handles, the pommels, on top. You swing your legs in circles and scissors with your weight on your hands.

The snap that gets you off the ground: slamming the tail down on a skateboard, or the hard push of a bunny hop. More pop means more height and more time.

Landing with the board on its side, wheels sideways under your feet. A common way a flip trick goes wrong, and a good way to roll an ankle.

British Gymnastics' older numbered badge scheme, from the days it was called BAGA. Rise Gymnastics has replaced it, but some clubs and many parents still use its badge numbers.

The ladder of easier steps that leads to a trick, each learned before the next. Coaches teach every big trick as a progression.

Getting speed from a ramp without pushing or pedalling: crouch through the bottom of the transition and stand up as it rises. How riders keep a run going.

Touching a foot to the ground to stop or save yourself. A line with no put downs means nothing touched down between the tricks.

A single curved ramp with coping on top and a deck behind it: a quarter of a circle. The building block of every park. Riders just say a quarter.

A round metal bar to grind or slide along. This library only uses low, flat rails close to the ground, never handrails down stairs.

Bouncing straight off the floor or the board with stiff legs, rather than bending and jumping. UK schemes say rebound; US coaches say punch, and a punch front is a front somersault straight out of one.

Gymnastics in weekly classes open to everyone, for fun and progress, rather than in a squad picked to compete. Recreational gymnasts still earn badges and enter club competitions.

Catching the bar again after letting go of it in a swing or a release move. Letting go is the release; catching is the regrasp.

A landing ramp covered in a soft, springy surface so a failed flip hurts less. Riders go foam pit, then resi, then a normal wooden ramp.

A men's apparatus: two rings hanging from straps 2.8 metres up. The rings move, so holding still on them takes huge strength.

A tear in the skin of your palm from swinging on bars, like a blister that opens. Grips and chalk help prevent them.

British Gymnastics' programme and badge scheme for recreational classes, in three phases: Discover for pre-school, Explore for school age and Excel for advanced recreational gymnasts. It replaced the Proficiency awards.

A set of skills joined together and performed in one go on one apparatus. Floor routines are done to music.

A rider's turn on the park or course, one trick after another, as judged in a contest. A lap is one clean circuit of the park.

Raising your arm, or both arms, to the judges before and after a routine, to show you are ready and that you have finished.

On a skateboard, dragging the back foot round the tail as you pop so the board spins flat, as in a shuvit. A harder scoop gives more spin.

The board spins 180 degrees flat under your feet while you hop and keep facing the same way. A pop shuvit adds an ollie so it spins in the air.

Sliding along an edge on the wooden part of a skateboard, or the underside of a scooter deck, rather than on the trucks or pegs. Boardslides and tailslides are slides.

A full turn in the air, head over heels, forwards or backwards, landing on your feet. Salto is the international word for the same thing; UK schemes mostly say somersault.

Tricks named by the degrees you turn. A 180 is half a turn, a 360 a full one, a 540 one and a half, a 720 two, which riders call a seven.

Looking for where you are going to land partway through a spin, flip or twist. Spotting early is what stops a rotation being a guess. In a gym, a spot is also a coach's hands helping you round while you learn; on wheels, it is a place to ride.

A coach who holds, lifts or guides you through a trick while you learn it, so you get round safely. Being spotted is a normal step on the way to doing it alone.

The springy board at the end of the vault run. You land on it with both feet and it throws you up and forward. It also helps mounts onto the beam and bars.

The competition floor: a 12 by 12 metre carpet laid over foam, boards and springs, with a little bounce for tumbling.

A group picked to train for competitions, by invitation, usually for more hours a week than a recreational class.

A set of steps ridden as an obstacle: you ollie or hop from the top and land at the bottom. A stair set is counted by its steps.

Stopping on the coping or a ledge for a beat, balanced on trucks, pegs, tail or a wheel, then dropping back in. Stalls come before grinds.

How you stand on the board or deck, and which foot leads. Riding your normal way is regular; the other way round is switch.

Landing without moving your feet: no step, no hop. A stuck landing loses no marks for the landing.

A shape with your legs straight and wide apart, like a V.

Riding the furniture of a street: ledges, rails, stairs, kerbs and walls. The library's category for grinds, slides, gaps and wallrides.

Riding with your feet swapped from your normal stance, so your other foot leads. Not the same as fakie, where the feet stay put and you roll backwards.

The back end of a skateboard or scooter deck. On a board it is what you pop; a tail tap or tail stall rests it on an edge. The front end is the nose.

A swing on bars with a tap in it: the fast snap of the hips near the bottom of a swing that throws your feet forward and up at the front of the swing. The tap is what gives a swing its height.

The two long edges of a skateboard. The toe edge is under your toes, the heel edge under your heels. Grabs and flicks are named by which edge you use.

A small square trampoline, tilted towards you, that you run and jump onto for vaults, jumps and somersaults.

Airing out of one ramp or bank and landing in a different one, crossing the gap or corner between them instead of coming back down the same ramp.

The curved part of a ramp or bowl between the flat ground and the top. Transition riding means ramps and bowls; street riding means everything else.

The metal axles bolted under a skateboard that hold the wheels and steer as you lean. Grinds run on the trucks; a 50-50 grinds on both.

A shape with your knees pulled up to your chest, as small and tight as you can make it.

A long, narrow, springy runway, often 15 metres or more, for practising tumbling with extra bounce.

Rolls, handsprings, flicks and somersaults done one after another along the floor. In artistic gymnastics tumbling is part of floor, and one run of it is a tumbling pass.

Turning round the line of your spine while you are in the air, usually during a somersault. A full twist is one whole turn.

The women's bars: two bars at different heights, the low bar about 1.7 metres up and the high bar about 2.5. You swing, circle and fly between them.

A trick where the board spins a half turn under you, or, in a body varial, where you spin a half turn and the board does not. Two opposite uses of one word.

A padded box built from stacking sections, so its height can change. Schools and clubs jump off it and vault over it.

The padded table you vault over in competition, 1.2 metres long and 1.25 metres high for women, 1.35 for men. It replaced the old vaulting horse in 2001.

A ramp so tall that its transition goes fully vertical at the top. Vert riding is big airs above the coping.

Stretches and easy exercises at the start of a session that get your body ready before any tricks.

Candle or skate wax rubbed onto a ledge or rail so it slides smoothly. A waxed ledge grinds further and catches less.

A firm foam mat that slopes like a wedge of cheese, which is why clubs call it a cheese mat. Going downhill on it makes rolls and walkovers easier to learn.

Kicking the deck or frame in a full circle round the bars while you hang in the air, then landing back on it. The scooter's signature move, borrowed from BMX.

A normal wooden ramp, as opposed to a foam pit or a resi landing. Foam, then resi, then wood is the order riders learn flips in.

A USA Gymnastics competition programme whose divisions are Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum, Diamond and Sapphire. Land The Trick's gymnastics difficulty names borrow the first five.