How to skid on a fixed gear bike

The skid is a major fixed gear feature that is primordial to master.
Skidding consists in blocking the rear wheel with the pedals to make it drift.

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

Requirements

There are also some other minor requirements to improve your skidding experience:

Your chain must be tightened
Your inner tubes must be insuflated enough. An average good pressure would be 4bars for 25-28mm tires
If you have different handlebars in your garage, we highly recommend bullhorn as it allows to get at the front the bike. Otherwise, flat/riserbar or dropbar are also okay and won’t prevent you to skid!

With straps

You must be able to easily get your foot out from the strap. Be sure you’re comfortable inside the strap: you should be able to pull your foot up and not causing the pedal to move; this way, you’re sure it holds your foot well.

It’s highly recommended to train skid with only the dominant foot strap. To determine which foot it is, it could be the foot you use to shoot 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 proned to skid than the other!

Now that you’re ready, here we go!

First, ride at an average speed: riding to slow won’t allow you to practise. At the opposite riding too fast will make the skid harder to time.
Wait for your dominant foot to come front, just before the horizontal position: that’s the pedal position where you can skid
Once you’ve identified this point there are simultaneous things 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. The best position to reach is « crotch on stem »
- Strengthen your arms and chest
- Pulling the front pedal and pushing the back pedal. More than blocking the pedals, you should really try to crank backward!
  
  NOTE: If you have difficulties to skid, you could consider trying on a less rough surface. Sandy grounds are good for training purpose.
After a few attemps, you could try to ajust pour weight backward and forward, so that you’ll brake more or less

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 the 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.

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…

Happy skidding 🙂

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

Video Tutorial

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

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