How to Backside Fifty Fifty Coping on a Skateboard

The backside fifty fifty is a super fun coping trick on a skateboard. Once you have backside axle stalls dialed, the 50-50 is just a faster, more commited version of that trick. This is the easiest grind there is, and once you learn it you can learn to slide farther and farther pretty quickly. It allows you to finally start keeping your speed as you hit coping and beyond, so learning to backside fifty will help you pump your way around a park or pool with far more ease, style, and speed.

The Setup

The backside axle stall is a definite prerequisite to this trick, so if you don’t have it dialed, go watch that tutorial and learn it. So setting up for a 50-50 is like setting up for a backside axle stall, except it’s much faster and much more aggressive. As you ride up the ramp for an axle stall, your body is perpendicular to the coping and you have just enough speed to get onto the coping. In a backside 50-50, you will take much more speed and ride up the ramp at an angle, carving in a way that your back begins to turn towards the coping as you rise.

From here it’s the same concept as an axle stall, except it’s fast. Your first few tries you’re likely to miss either your front or rear trucks on the coping and end up in a boardslide or just slipping. That’s totally fine! It takes some getting used to. Focus on pivoting to a perfect parallel with the coping as you reach the top of the coping. If you keep slipping, slow it down a little bit. Take small steps. Start with an axle stall, and then take a small carve and slide 2 feet. Once you figure that out, speed it up a bit, take a bigger carve, and slide 4 feet. Keep going a bit at a time until you can pump up the ramp at full speed and slide the entire coping.

Extra Tips

In an axle stall your back wheels may be lying on the deck as you prepare to drop in again. In a fifty fifty, this isn’t ideal. Try to stay angled on the coping with your momentum keeping you rightside up. Ideally, your trucks are the only thing on the ground, and the ground is the coping. Dropping back in is easy as long as you commit. If you’ve got axle stalls dialed, it’s the same concept except you actually roll in a bit easier with the extra speed. When you’re ready to drop back in, just put a put of weight on the tail and pivot that rear wheel over the coping. It should be one fluid motion.

Best of luck with this trick. It is super fun once you figure it out! Leave a comment below if you have questions. Let me know when you get it as well!