Your Wheels and You

A lot of people wonder what they are doing wrong when it comes to longboarding. Whether they are trying to slide, bomb hills, slalom, or whatever they do with their board, most people make the same mistake. It's not always a small tip or adjustment to help you preform better, it's all in the wheels you have. The basic parts of a wheel are simple to understand and will be broken down for you: Wheel diameter, contact surface, and hardness.

Wheel Diameter
Longboard wheels are most traditionally meant for cruising with a basic range of 60-100 millimeters. This range is much greater than those of a skateboard and allow for a smoother ride. Typically, the larger the wheel diameter, the smoother a ride you will have. The slalom scene usually have a larger wheel because of their smoothness in riding and also makes it easier on he bearings in the long run. Smaller wheels rotate more to get the same distance but accelerate typically quicker than larger ones. For slalom go larger, for hills go smaller.

Contact Surface
When riding, you need to know if you will be wanting to stick your wheels to the ground more of have more ability to let the longboard slide freely. The wider a wheel you have, the more contact surface to the ground it has, and typically will hold the ground better which can become very useful in a slalom type setting. The narrower a wheel, the less contact surface it will have, and typically let go of the ground easier. More contact surface also means more friction and can let the board slow down faster and accelerate less. Exceptions to these rules can be determined on the wheel hardness.

Wheel Hardness
Your style will be either sliding or not sliding, it's that easy. The hardness is determined by the durometer A scale [which is how dense the wheel is]. Softer wheels are seen around the 75A range, but can differ up and down from that. Harder wheels can be seen anywhere from 86A up to 99A. The softer a wheel, the more traction it will have in holding the concrete, and opposite for hard wheels (they let go and slide on concrete fairly easy}. The hardness can affect your riding a lot because on slalom you will normally want a softer wheel, downhill might want a medium wheel (depending if you want to slide or not), and other sliding will want a hard wheel.

Additionally!
Those three factors are just the basics. Wheels also come with a few different shapes as well. The shape of a wheel is typically either with rounded edges or squared off edges. Casual riding and slalom take a squared edge because when turning that edge will catch concrete and hold traction very nicely. Rounded edges on wheels are great for sliding because they have no extra edge to catch concrete and just let go to start the slide.