Are you ready to take your skateboarding to the next level and learn one of the most beautiful flat ground tricks in all of skateboarding? Well, ready or not, we’re here to teach you how to master the 360 flip. It was invented by Rodney Mullen in the 1980s, but truly popularized by Jason Lee in the mid 90’s.

The 360 Flip is an iconic trick that skateboarders all over the world know and love. When you see a clean, well executed 360 Flip, it just makes you want to get on your board and skate. If you’re new to skateboarding, it’ll make you want to learn it.

We receive a lot of Skate Supports for 360 Flips. Most of the barriers and problems we see are covered in this post. So if you get through this post and need some extra assistance, send us a Skate Support! We’ll be more than happy to help you with that as well!

If you want to start learning this trick you should be able to Kickflip and have all of your other basic tricks down. You should minimally have all tricks from Skateboarding Made Simple Volume 1 mastered! Before we get to the tutorial, it’s important to know the definition of the 360 flip.

360 Flip Definition

360 Kickflip, or 360 Flips, are achieved by combining the 360 Shove-it and Kickflip as one spin/flip trick.

Also known as 3-Flips, Tre-Flips, Trè, etc…

Seems simple enough right? Well, once you get the hang of them, they can feel very easy! Getting to that point, however, will take some practice and persistence.

Below is a video tutorial that will cover the fine details of this trick. After you’ve watched the video, read the information that follows to make sure you’re fully prepared to go out there and start landing 360 Flips!

360 Flip Tutorial

We hope you enjoyed the tutorial and that you gained some insight on how to do a 360 Flip. Let’s go over the material from the video and recap what we learned to really drill those 360 Flip mechanics into your head.  When learning the 360 Flip, it helps to go over these 5 crucial steps:

1. Foot Position
2. Body Position
3. Back Foot Scoop
4. Front Foot Flick
5. Landing

Foot Position

For the 360 Flip, place your front foot on the board and position it just like you would for a Kickflip. Place your back foot at the end of the tail with your toes hanging over the edge of your board. The most important part of this trick is the back foot scoop, so be sure to have the proper positioning for your back foot.

Body Position

A common mistake that a lot of skateboarders make when learning the 360 Flip is leaning too far forward. This will cause you to land either in front of your board, or on the nose end of your board. The best way to correct this is to make sure you have the proper body position before you pop the 360 Flip.

It’s important to be slightly leaning back. When you’re leaning back while popping the 360 Flip, your board will shoot out in front of you, so you can land and ride away clean. Make sure you keep your back straight, lean back slightly, and have your shoulders opened up like you would for a Kickflip.

Now that you’ve got the proper posture and foot position for the 360 Flip, it’s time to learn how to make the magic happen… That’s right. The back foot scoop.

Back foot scoop

It really is true when people say the key to the 360 Flip is in the back foot. With your toes hanging over the edge of the board, you will need to give the board a very hard scoop.  It’s very important to have your weight on your back foot. If you have your weight on your back foot you’re going to be able to get that powerful scoop. The majority of your power is going into your back foot which is exactly what you need to scoop that board and make it do the 360 rotation.

You can practice by standing next to your board and placing your back foot in 360 Flip position. Now, simply pop the board into a 360 motion. It doesn’t matter if the board flips or only spins, this practice step is just to get you to work on the scoop with your back foot. This step will teach you the importance of slightly curling the toes of your back foot around the edge of the tail while strongly scooping to get the proper rotation. 

Front foot flick

Do not focus too much on the front foot! This can cause you to over flip or under spin your 360 Flips. While the majority of the work is done with the back foot, the front foot only needs to lightly flick the board in a Kickflip motion.

You won’t be flicking directly off the nose of the board like you would with a traditional Kickflip. Try flicking more off the side of it as it begins spinning from your scoop. You’ll see in any footage of a 360 Flip that the front foot is not very engaged during this trick. It just gently flicks off the board to help it flip fully during the 360-degree rotation.

During most of this trick, your front foot will just be floating above the board waiting to catch it. That’s exactly where you want it. Again, emphasize on that back foot scoop while your front foot does a light upwards flick and stays over the board.

Landing

If you’ve kept your back straight, leaned back slightly with your back foot mostly weighted, scooped hard, and flicked lightly, you should be able to land this trick pretty easily. It should be as easy as catching the board with the front foot, extending that back knee and getting your back foot on the board. After that, roll away clean!

Remember that while you do all of these steps, you’ll need to jump with and stay over your skateboard. It sounds like it should be easy but it will take lots of practice and hard work.

Once you are used to all the motions, spotting the board and catching it with your front foot will become easier.  With some perseverance and all of the great Braille Skateboarding resources we have to offer, you’ll be rolling away clean from 360 flips in no time. 

In Conclusion

 The 360 Flip is one of the featured tricks in Skateboarding Made Simple Volume 5. SMS 5 primarily focuses intermediate flatground tricks. It is the most useful skateboarding tutorial series ever made. It uses Aaron’s extremely detailed and successful approach to teaching skating. You will learn each trick fast and in the correct order. Get this video now and take your skating to the next level!

Lastly, we want to see your best 360 Flip! Film a quick clip of landing your best 360 Flip then post it on Instagram tagging @brailleskate, #brailleskate, and #brailleskateboarding.  Let us know what helped you the most so we can highlight that and can get everyone landing 360 Flips!

Looking for some other tricks to learn? Check out our Skateboarding Trick Guide! You’ll find more detailed blog posts there on other tricks covered in Skateboarding Made Simple!