How Wizard Skating Changed Rollerblading

Both Wizard skating and aggressive inline skating came from the modification of recreational rollerblades - there was just different end goals at the time.

Although the style different they have both changed each style.

In todays video we are going to explore the history of rollerblading, what makes up traditional street skating, what is wizard skating, how it started and developed and how it changed rollerblading

00:00 How wizard skating change rollerblading
00:20 History of rollerblading from the 90s
01:13 Road to Nowhere a change in style for rollerblading
01:43 KCMO the evolution of Alex Broskow, Chris Farmer, Sean Kelso and Colin Kelso
02:28 Who is Leon Basin and What is a Wizard Frame
03:59 What is Wizard skating like
04:47 Mushroom Blading and Wizard Skating
06:05 The progression of Wizard skating - Why street skaters do it
06:58 Big Wheel rollerblading
07:36 Wizard skating influencing aggressive skating. Junky Park and Mike Torres
08:05 Ice hockey and rollerbladers
08:27 Michael Witzemann and Colin Kelso on wizard skating
09:37 modern day rollerblading and it’s creative past - Oli Short, Dustin Latimer
10:24 different rollerblade set-ups, frames, wheels
11:00 Control while skating
11:32 Aggressive skating and wizard skating work together.

[AtLeastTryALittle]

As someone who grew up skateboarding and was always a board sport person, this feels like learning about an alternate universe to me.

[JustAnotherBlader]

The flat ground / mushroom / wizard stuff was honestly just what aggressive blading needed, just something to remind us that we barely even scratched the surface.

[dmofOfficial]

Trying wizard frames made me realize that I don't rollerblade, I just grind. When you first experience that "ice feeling" of the wizard setup... OMFG! Wizard and aggressive are a positive feedback loop, and I'm stoked about it!

[danielshults]

As someone who does not skate, but grew up in the hey day of all things "extreme" on wheels, I'm really enjoying these videos. It's fun learning about a subculture like this still going strong and evolving.

[jimmydubjay]

As someone in that primary age-range, wizard skating made it seem like coming back to rollerblading in my mid 30s still left me with something awesome to practice, without the added risk of what aggressive seemed to present to me as a novice. Thanks for speaking to that!
Also I was like "goddamn that looks pretty and fun. I want"

[NoQualmsTheArtist]

I grew up in the Senate Skate era. I've broken almost every bone in my body aggressive skating. I'm definitely in that age bracket and haven't skated in over a decade. I've never heard of Wizard before. Maybe I've found my new thing 🤔

[jagdteaguer]

Man this video popped up in my feed randomly and made me so happy to see wizard blading and Leon being talked about, dude was always a vibe to skate with. Shout out to the RPT boys if any of yall see this.

[viktorialova]

thanks for the clip feature, and the great video!

first time i saw JKs skating it felt like discovering a new color.

[keeleycarrigan]

This is awesome. Skating was my life in the 90s. Really cool to see it hasn’t completely died.

[fDeqPNGHxk]

Agree! Wizard is challenging, especially on flat frame :-)
It looks good and feels very satisfying when completed

[secession]

It's the salmon and butter background images for me.

And yeah, wizard skating is something indeed contagious. It's like you can now commute through a city in a stylish way 😁

[bakedbeings]

Magic vid! I felt like the biggest limitation to aggressive blading in the x games days was that it was so busy emulating skateboarding tricks, including grabbing your skates. Not only was it limiting and inherently a little silly to casual audiences, it creates a muddy silhouette. Those wizard inspired grinds and slides do a great job of changing the body into dynamic, directional, graceful S and C curves 👌 playing with traction is sick too, breaking into slides while crossing banks/transitions etc.

[shipuku]

i can barely stop on my skates, but this is making me excited. i wanna learn how to do those slippery tricks!

[graykaizoku]

This is like the first time I saw someone butter on a snowboard all those years ago. I didnt know it existed and the stats showing the aging participants is motivating as i enter that 44% demo. Thanks for the enjoyable video

[grahamhowland]

Having recently turned 40 and been pretty into aggressive blading in my teens I’ve picked up a set of blades again, I always skated a flat set up back then so went for what I was used to and I’m really glad I did as hopefully it will open up possibilities for this more flow inspired type of stuff which should be a bit kinder on my body 👍🏼

[PressuredSpeechBand]

We all secretly want to go back to the 90's-00's and wear a pair of wizard skates!

[jmin]

Just wanted to say a general thank you to you and the others making great content, as well as the designers making these awesome products. Completely reignited the joy I felt from skating as a kid in the 90's, with no ego, just fun. Im a old fart now that doesn't bounce like I used to, but I still love watching my kids at the skate park. Almost 40 and can't wait to get home and strap the skates on.

[maurice.momenti]

Thanks for making this vid Tom!
I love how you highlight both sports benefitting one another. Its very interesting to see how inline will develop in the future, feels like there is still so much to invent and discover! I hope agg and wizard skaters will think of themselves more and more like dancers. In my eyes both do expressive performance art. Especially arms seem like very unchartered territory :D

[viennois]

Editing is just like butter in spring sun.

[almostremembered]

Love the video essay format. This is your best work yet IMO. Maybe it's just the fact that it's the most interesting subject matter to me but, regardless....amazing video Tom.