Learn the tre flip (360 flip): hard prerequisites, five stages from 360 shove-it to catch, the four classic error patterns and the passive-foot trick.
The tre flip, also called the 360 flip, combines two rotations in one jump: the board turns a full 360 degrees around the vertical axis like a 360 shove-it AND once around its long axis like a kickflip. You create both with a single hard scoop of the back foot — the front foot only gives the nudge.
Straight talk: the tre flip is not a kickflip with extra rotation. It is a 360 shove-it that gets a glancing hit from the front foot on the way past. Think of it as a flip and you will over-flick and produce crooked rotations for months.
The good news is in the lab data. When researchers used EMG to compare the muscle activity of seven experienced skaters during ollie, kickflip and 360 flip, the number of muscle synergies did not differ significantly between the three tricks [1] — the tre flip is neuromuscularly no more complex than a kickflip. What makes it hard is precision under time pressure, not complexity. The same study did find high variability between skaters [1]: there is no single correct stance.
The bad news is physics. Two rotations need flight time, and flight time is jump height. In an ollie up onto or down off a 45.7 cm platform, around 2.22 plus/minus 0.22 body weights were measured on take-off and 4.74 plus/minus 0.46 body weights on landing within the first 30 to 80 milliseconds [2] — almost five times your weight in the blink of an eye. For the tre flip itself there is no force measurement here; two rotations need more height, though, and more height means a harder landing — physics, not a study result.
The tre flip is the first trick in this series with real admission criteria. Without them you are practising luck:
First the full vertical-axis rotation with no flip at all: back foot with the toes in the tail pocket, hard scoop down and back, front foot only lifting along. Without this stage there is no tre flip. Milestone: 5 out of 10 360 shove-its landed and rolled away.
Back foot with the toes on the rear tail corner, heel hanging slightly over. Front foot lower and flatter than for a kickflip, roughly between the bolts and the middle of the deck, toes minimally over the edge. The stance has to be reproducible, not pretty. Milestone: you find both positions blind, ten times identically in a row.
Now both together, standing or rolling very slowly: hard scoop down and back, while the front foot drags up the deck and grazes the nose corner. Deliberately land next to it. Milestone: in 8 out of 10 attempts the board rotates 360 degrees AND flips once, landing on its wheels.
Only once the double rotation goes through consistently: the back foot catches first over the tail and stops both rotations, the front foot follows immediately onto the front bolts. Eyes on the board. Milestone: two-footed landing over both trucks, even without rolling away.
Add speed, land deep, knees soft. Then the honest test: does it still work in minute 40 of a session? Milestone: three landed tre flips in a row while rolling.
By experience, flip tricks are fall-prone — with two rotations and a tight landing area even more so. At pro level the impact height rises.
Your main risk remains the ankle. In an online survey of 197 Spanish skaters, ligament sprains were the most common type of injury at 39.6 percent, mostly at the ankle — and they also led among recurring injuries (68.7 percent of the 67 reported recurrences) [5] — an ankle that has been injured once stays a risk. And 87.8 percent of respondents did no skate-specific training programme [5]. At this level that is no longer an oversight, it is a decision against your own season.
The landing itself runs through your forefoot: in a simulation study the load was highest at the middle metatarsals, which makes forefoot cushioning in a skate shoe biomechanically central [6]. Add the chronic load: In a survey of 64 skaters, 82.8 percent reported current pain and 68.8 percent had an injury in the past year [7], more often than statistically expected at the knee, ankle, lumbosacral region and foot.
Two rules for tre flip sessions. First: fatigue is a documented risk factor [8] — attempt number 80 is the dangerous one, not the first. Set an attempt limit before you start. Second: do not practise it over stairs or gaps while it is not consistent on flat.
This guide explains and motivates, it does not replace supervised coaching or a physiotherapeutic assessment. With recurring rolled ankles or pain that lasts for days you see a professional.
Make your front foot deliberately passive.
The most common cause of crooked tre flips is not a lack of skill but too much front foot. Skaters think of the trick as a kickflip with extra rotation, flick hard forward and out — and tilt the rotation axis in the process. The result is a board spinning off-axis that lands on its edge.
The drill: twenty attempts in which your front foot is allowed to do nothing but slide up the deck. No deliberate flick, no wind-up. All the drive comes from the back foot's scoop. You will be surprised: the board flips anyway — because the nose corner takes the foot along by itself.
Once the rotation runs flat and even, you give the front foot back just enough for it to come round cleanly. — and for the tre flip, smart means less foot, more scoop.
With a stable kickflip and 360 shove-it, most people count in months rather than weeks until it is consistent. There are no solid learning-time studies for skate tricks, that is experience talking. A scoping review even notes that no research has yet linked the demands of skateboarding directly to competitive success [3] — so compare yourself with your own last clip, not with Instagram.
Yes, and it is the single most important prerequisite. The tre flip is a 360 shove-it with a glancing hit, not a kickflip with rotation. Without the isolated full vertical-axis rotation you are attempting two unknown movements at once — and learning neither.
Because your front foot leaves the deck too early. Set it lower, roughly between the front bolts and the middle of the deck, and let it run over the nose corner as you pull up. The flip comes from contact at the corner, not from force.
Your front foot sits too far forward and your back foot stays down. Both tip the board nose-up. After the scoop, pull both knees towards your chest and catch with the back foot first — then the deck comes flat underneath you.
The movement itself is comparably complex neuromuscularly [1], but you need more height — and more height means a harder landing (physics, not a measurement on the tre flip). Add the sheer number of attempts: 80 tries make you tired, and fatigue is a documented risk factor [8].
The Ollie: How to Learn the Jump That Makes Every Other Trick Possible