If you are looking for casual and fun exercise that will strengthen your lower body muscles and improve your balance and coordination, skateboarding can be a great choice. Find out how to work out on a skateboard and get tips to minimize the risk of injury and maximize the health benefits associated with skateboarding.

How Is Skateboarding Good Exercise?

Skateboarding is usually a low-to-moderate intensity physical activity. Recreational skateboarders often take breaks between cruising and practicing tricks, which limits the intensity of sessions. You can get a good workout by finding ways to keep moving.

You should start by learning to control the board. Pushing the board, riding and turning on flat ground can burn some calories. As you become more skilled, you can try riding up inclines or around bowls at a skatepark to increase the intensity of your workouts. The best way to prevent or reduce the severity of injuries is to wear protective equipment including a helmet and pads on your elbows and knees while skateboarding.

In addition to burning more calories, learning how to do tricks on a skateboard can improve your coordination and build muscle. You can also practice how to fall safely, which can be beneficial on and off of the board.

What Are the Benefits of Skateboarding?

Skateboarding is a good exercise for strengthening many muscles. Keeping your balance on a moving board requires you to engage your abdominal muscles and the musculature of your hips and spine. Pushing a board or doing tricks works most of your leg muscles, including the quadriceps, hamstrings, gluteus maximus, calves and lower leg muscles.

You can build more muscle by doing tricks. The motions that are necessary to flip a board or do jumps engage similar muscles to exercises such as burpees, froggy jumps or squats. Using the ZOZOFIT app is the best way to measure muscle gain and track other physical benefits of skateboarding.

Many skateboarders report that the level of focus required to do this activity relieves stress. Other mental benefits can include a boost of confidence and improved self-esteem as you develop more skills. Skateboarding can also be a social activity. If you want to get in a good workout, you should prioritize the intensity of your practice sessions and socialize afterward.

Does Skateboarding Count as Cardio?

Riding a skateboard is likely to get you into the low-intensity heart rate zone, which is 50% of your maximum heart rate or less. You can find ways to increase the intensity of a cardio workout to a temperate or aerobic zone.

When you are new to skateboarding, you are likely to spend most of your practice sessions learning how to balance on and control the motion of a skateboard. While these basic principles can work a variety of muscles, you are less likely to get an intense cardio workout. As you get better at this activity, sustaining your level of movement can keep your heart rate elevated.

Learning to do tricks on a skateboard can help you get a more intense cardio workout and build muscle. Once you reach a certain skill level, skateboarding is good exercise for cardio, but you might still find sustaining a high heart rate to be a challenge.

How Many Calories Can You Burn by Skateboarding?

Skateboarding is good exercise when you do 30 minutes to one hour of continuous activity. The rate at which you burn calories will depend on the terrain and the intensity of your workout. According to a professor of exercise science, pushing a board on flat terrain can burn between eight and 12 calories per minute. You can raise this rate by riding up inclines.

Practicing flips and other types of tricks can be another way to increase the rate at which you burn calories. The calorie burn rate goes up to 30 extra calories per minute for intermediate tricks such as kickflips. You can burn up to 45 extra calories per minute by doing ollies and other jumps on a skateboard or more complex flips. As you become more skilled, you can also learn how to do aerial tricks, grinds and slides.

The calorie burn rate for any activity also depends on your weight. A person who weighs 125 pounds can burn about 292 calories by skateboarding for one hour. Someone who weighs 200 pounds can burn up to 468 calories per hour doing the same activity. You should consider all of these factors when calculating how many calories you can burn by skateboarding.

Which Types of Exercise Can Supplement Skateboarding?

Whether you want to slim down or build muscle, you can reach your fitness goals faster by combining skateboarding with other workouts. It can be easier to maintain target heart rate zones for set periods of time and get more of the fat burning benefits of cardio by cycling, jumping rope, running or swimming.

Riding a skateboard tends to favor muscles on one side of your body based on the foot that you use to push the board. Working towards developing ambidexterity with your feet or compensating with weight training can help you even out muscle growth from this activity. You can also do yoga to further improve your balance, increase flexibility and strengthen core muscles.

You might also consider trying other board sports, such as snowboarding or surfing. These activities have unique skill sets but involve the same basic principle of stability. Riding a board on snowy terrain or waves can be a challenging way to increase the balance, coordination and strength necessary to skateboard on paved surfaces.

Why Is Skateboarding Good Exercise?

Skateboarding is a good exercise that you can do at a skatepark or other locations that allow this activity. Whether you have always wanted to learn how to skateboard or want to start skateboarding again, cruising on a board and learning how to do tricks can be a fun way to work out. Track the results of your active lifestyle in the ZOZOFIT app.