Your foot placement for the one wheeled hang ten is very different to the regular one. Your back foot wants to be at roughly a 35º-45º angle across the front truck, with the ball of the back foot positioned right above the toeside wheel. The front foot then slots in alongside it, with the heel above the heelside wheel. Obviously, this means you need to keep the majority of your weight on the back leg. Don’t lean back at this point or you’ll shoot out.

To begin the wheelie, you need to move the board in two stages. First, you need to push forwards with the back foot, shifting your weight in such a way that it feels like the balls of that foot are pushing into the side of the deck. That’ll lift the heelside wheels up; you can practice this off the board, as shown above. Once you’re doing that while riding the board, you shift some of your weight to the front foot, lifting the back wheels off the ground. Hold your back foot in place or you’ll drop the heelside wheel back down!

This is what you’re aiming for. Try to get that heelside wheel as high as you can. If you’re struggling to get enough leverage for this trick, try swapping out your bushings for something harder. A barrel bottom bushing – or even one of the stepped Venom Eliminator bushings – will resist your weight even more and make getting this wheel up a bit easier.

Finding your balance can be a bit unusual. Unlike a regular hang ten, you’re not very well aligned, and you’re not in a natural position. Be prepared to arch a lot more, with your knees out past your toes and your shoulders further back than feels comfortable. Don’t expect to be able to hold a one wheeled hang ten for too long – two or three parking spaces is respectable enough at first.

Additional Notes

As with regular wheelies, it really helps to have goals when you’re learning this trick. Practicing in a car park/parking lot will give you a way to measure the distance you’ve travelled.

Also, speed will help balance everything out. You don’t want to do these too slowly, as every little bump will jolt you off your board. It might seem scary going quickly, but it’ll actually make it much easier.

A good general rule to live by with all hang ten tricks is to keep your weight slightly further forward instead of slightly further back. Falling off forwards is a simple run-out. On the other hand, falling off backwards is a good way to crack your skull open. One of these situations is much better than the other.

As with all one wheeled wheelies, you really need harder bushings and relatively tight trucks before you can even think about learning this trick. Note that if you want to have your trucks set so that they can still turn a bit, you’ll need to compensate with a taller board than usual. Consider using taller trucks or risers.

Again, like with the regular wheelie, there are a few things you can do to your setup to make these easier:

• Mellower kicktails will make the board more sensitive, reducing the amount of pressure you have to introduce to lift the nose
• Larger, softer wheels and good bearings will increase the distance you can roll without slowing down
• A taller board will give you more space between the nose and the floor while you’re balancing the wheelie, reducing the chance of “snowplowing” the nose and stopping dead
• A nose skid will reduce friction if the nose does slide on the floor slightly, reducing the risk of pitching forwards onto your face
• If you’re skating a single kick, consider turning the board around and doing these on the kicktail to give yourself a bit more clearance between the deck and the ground during the nose wheelie.