👠Weight Distribution with Cross-Stepping~ #tiptimetuesday On longboards, cross stepping is the key to opening up the entire board as our dance floor. The dynamics that make it possible to stand on the tip of the nose or tail are very detailed, but in muscle memory, they begin to make sense. Shuffling our feet to move around can be a useful tool as well, but it is not as efficient as cross stepping which allows for quick motion. Because the board also slides under our feet as we move up and back on the board, cross stepping allows us to sweep the board under our feet by pushing into the board with our steps. Shuffling does not allow for this added motion atop the board. A common mistake with cross stepping is with weight distribution. As you can see here in this video of Rosie, she always maintains her center of gravity over the back foot line as she moves up the board. The most common mistake I see is on the second step, people tend to lean forward onto their front foot. This stops our momentum, but also pushes the nose down, which can cause the board to pearl. Pay close attention to your weight distribution when you’re cross stepping towards the nose, keep it centered over the back foot line - this will open up the rest of the steps forward to the nose! For cross stepping back towards the tail, a common mistake is to lean too far over the back foot as we move back. This will cause the board to shoot out in front of us as we move towards the tail. To avoid this, instead of leaning back as we cross-step back, push into the back foot instead. If we push down into the board with our feet, instead of leaning our weight, we’ll maintain a much more stable connection with the board. Video: @simplyserene546 Surfer: @rosiejaffurs Words by: @leahloves