Snowboarding Lingo: Snowboard Terminology

Boarder Talk: Talk like a Snowboarding Champ: Snowboard Terminology

Snowboard Culture has its own unique flavor including music, apparel, and language. Many snowboarders speak their own language and create new terms to describe new moves. Familiarize yourself with snowboard lingo to fit in with the crowd on the mountain. Here are a few interesting terms used by snowboarders. Ask us about Snowboarding in Maine or share your comments.

Snowboarding Terminology

Alley-Oop
Any maneuver in the halfpipe where you rotate 180 or more degrees in the uphill direction.

Regular
Riding with your left foot in the forward position.

Goofy
Riding with your right foot in the forward position.

Fakie
Riding backwards, meaning the opposite direction than your usual stance.

Backside Rodeo
Turning your back downhill when coming off a jump, flipping 540 and landing fakie or rotating 720 and landing regular.

Boned Out
Over-exagerating body positions when doing tricks, often giving the legs the appearance of being extended or stretched to the maximum degree.

Bonk
Hitting an object with your snowboard.

Duck Foot
A riding stance where heels are together and toes point outward away from one another.

Grind
To ride objects such as boxes and handrails with a snowboard.

Hammer
To ride as hard as possible.

Leafing
To ride backside against the upward slope, toe side forward, zigzagging sideways down like a falling leaf, usually a novice move.

Ollie
A hopping motion achieved by lifting first the front foot, then the rear foot before springing off the tail of the snowboard.

Nollie
A reversed Ollie, leading with the rear foot first.

Rolling Down the Windows
The spinning of your arms wildly in the air in an attempt to regain balance.

Yardsale
The event of an epic crash large enough to lose your hat and mittens on the slope.