How to skid on a fixed gear bike

The skid is a major fixed gear trick that is primordial to master in order to stop, or gain access to more advanced tricks like 180-skid. Skidding consists in blocking the rear wheel with the straps & pedals to make it drift.

There’s two kinds of skids, with or without straps.

Requirements

There are minor requirements to improve your skid learning experience:

• Your chain must be tightened

• Your tires must be inflated enough. An average good pressure would be around 5-6 bars for 25-28mm tires

• If you have different handlebars in your garage, we highly recommend flat/riser-bar or bullhorn as they allow to get at the front the bike. Otherwise, drop-bars work and won't prevent you to skid!

With straps

You must be able to easily get your foot out of the strap. Be sure you’re comfortable with your foot inside of it: you should be able to pull your foot without causing the pedal to dangle; this way, you’re sure it holds your foot well when you will pull on it.

It’s highly recommended to learn skid using only the dominant foot strap. To determine which foot it is, it could be the foot you use to kick a ball or your strongest foot. It could also be the foot you use to bunny hop. But don't be worried, you'll know quickly just by practising: one foot will be a lot more eager to skid than the other!

Here, Ines’ right foot is dominant, so the right foot is forward

Now that you’re ready, here we go!

1. First, ride at an average speed: riding to slow won’t allow you to experience the feeling. At the opposite riding too fast will make the skid interval shorter and be harder to trigger.

2. Wait for your dominant foot to come front, just before the horizontal position: that’s the pedal position where you will start blocking the crankset.

3. Once you have identified the trigger timing, there are three simultaneous actions to coordinate :

   • Get your weight up front. This it to us the most important part because it will make the rear wheel easier to block (without less weight it is more eager to drift!). The best position to reach is « crotch on stem ».

   • Strengthen your arms and chest when you’re up front.

   • Pull the front pedal and push the back pedal. More than blocking the pedals, you should really try to crank backward at first, with practice you’ll just strengthen them (in the continuity of your arms, and chest).

4. After a few attempts, you could try to adjust your weight backward and forward, so that you will brake more or less

NOTE: If you have difficulties to skid, you should consider trying on a less rough surface. Sandy grounds are good for training purpose.

Without straps

It’s also possible to skid strapless on a fixed gear. With this technique, it’s all about timing, and really getting up front the bike.

When the crankset is about to be horizontal, put your « crotch on stem » like a traditional skid and push backward with your non-dominant foot.

Note that your front foot has no contribution when you skid this way. This is what makes it harder to achieve in terms of timing.

Strapless skid on a wet surface, holding the abdomen against the bar (allowed by short stem!)

Conclusion

Skidding is really satisfying when you get it. It can even lead you to remove your brakes, if you feel confident enough! Meanwhile, it is at your own risk...

After a few attempts and small scratches on the ground, you should then skid like a pro !

We hope and hop to see you skidding around! If the tutorial helped you in any way, you can subscribe to @after.spin on Instagram!

Video Tutorial

Here is a video tutorial by Jackson Bradshaw, the founder of FOAD Gang :