Skateboarding
Skateboarding
What is: Skateboarding vs. Snowboarding
Skateboarding and snowboarding have the same roots and share many tricks. But there are also differences. We introduce them to you together with snowboard pro and skater Benny Urban.
Benny Urban - 50-50
© Rutger Pauw / Red Bull Content Pool
Leticia Bufoni – Frontside Boardslide
© Reece Leung / Red Bull Content Pool
All board sports are derived from surfing and as such there are many similarities and many who skate in the summer enjoy skating in the winter. It's the same with Benny Urban, for whom it's not an either/or question: he enjoys both sports. That's why he's the perfect interlocutor to compare skateboarding and snowboarding.
Benny Urban likes to switch elements.
© Lorenz Holder
For me, the passion came pretty much at the same time. Snowboarding in winter when the weather in the city is miserable. Then skating as soon as the sun is a little higher again.
01
Equipment
You often need the car to get to the mountain.
© Lorenz Holder
Equipment: snowboard vs. skateboard
If you want to start skateboarding, it is basically enough to get a reasonably decent complete board in the skate shop of your choice for around 100 euros. For this you need a pair of skate shoes, which are available from 60 euros. Basically, any other flat-soled shoe will do. That was it. If you want to be on the safe side, you can buy a set of protectors for 70 euros and a helmet, for which you have to pay another 60 euros. Then you are fully equipped to get started.
On the other hand, snowboarding is a little different. In addition to board, bindings, and boots, you also need snowboard pants and jacket, gloves, goggles, a helmet, and protectors. Altogether it is somewhere between 1000 - 1500 euros. So it's not trivial, which is why you should consider whether you'd rather rent equipment for testing or buy used equipment. Because in addition to the outfit, there are other costs...
For Benny Urban, snowboarding is therefore a privileged sport - for example, because athletes often need a car to get to the corresponding ski areas.
In my opinion, that's exactly why we need at least free snowboard parks or places without a lift. Easy for hiking close to town. Then even the skate kid from the city can borrow a board and try it out.
02
Availability
A small piece of asphalt is enough for endless fun.
© Karabo Mooki
The big advantage of skateboarding is that you can do it anywhere. As soon as you leave your apartment and your rollers touch asphalt, you're good to go. The skate photographer Craig Stecyk summed it up perfectly back in the 70s:
Two hundred years of American technology have unwittingly created a vast concrete playground with unlimited potential. But it was the minds of 11-year-olds that saw this potential.
It's more difficult with snowboarding. If you are not lucky enough to live in the mountains, you first have to put up with the journey, which, depending on the length and means of transport, costs money and pollutes the environment. When you get there, you still need a lift ticket, food and possibly accommodation, which is why a snowboarding weekend can quickly pull several 100 euros out of your wallet.
That's why I like street snowboarding and off-piste snowboarding in general. No rules and more accessibility.
03
Learning curve
It takes a while for a backside noseblunt à la Felipe Gustavo...
© Alex Sveda
Freestyle snowboarding and skateboarding share a similar learning curve. Both take really long compared to other sports.
Whether skateboarding or snowboarding, both require practice and dedication.
Skateboarding, however, is a bit more difficult and, above all, mistakes in learning hurt more. Skateboarding takes place on a hard surface and you stand on a wobbly board that is not attached to your feet. Falling, bruising, and abrasions are inevitable. Torn ligaments and broken bones are not uncommon. You gotta pay to play. Simply driving around should work after a while, but even for beginner tricks like an ollie, it can take several weeks of constant practice.
You won't become a pro snowboarder overnight either, but if you take a course and aren't clumsy you should be able to slide down an easy slope in a day. And even if you fall, you land softer. So you come in more relaxed and have a faster sense of achievement because you can carve down the piste after a relatively short time. The backside double cork 1080 then takes a while.
When snowboarding, you usually land softer, but unfortunately, you can't jump off the board.
As a result, the upper body or shoulders often hit first. Dislocated shoulders and broken collarbones are therefore common. "When jumping, being strapped in helps, of course," says Benny Urban.
04
Tricks
The tricks are similar and have the same names, but there are still differences. With grabs, grinds and slides everything is pretty much the same except there are no smith, feeble or crooked grinds in snowboarding. The axes are simply missing to log in these tricks. That's what the already mentioned double cork is for. Or even triple or quadruple cork.
Trick lists for skateboard and snowboard
Theoretically, that would be possible in skateboarding, just as traveling at almost the speed of light is theoretically possible... It is quite unlikely that it will ever come to that. And if so, the question arises whether you need them in skateboarding. After all, if you want to fly high and far, you have a snowboard. In return, skateboarders can move their board freely and perform all sorts of flip tricks that snowboarders are denied because of the binding.
The tricks and the respective feeling when practicing them are often very similar, only that it requires two completely different techniques. On the snowboard, the dimensions and the speed are usually much wider and higher than on the skateboard.
