Longboarding is extremely fun, and everyone can take part in it irrespective of experience level or age.
However, many people may think that it’s just a walk for entertainment without significant fitness and health benefits.
Is that true? Is longboarding good exercise? This street sport has numerous beneficial effects on our bodies. We’ll give a deeper explanation in the post.
Is Longboarding Good Exercise?
The short answer is yes. Longboarding is not only a healthy and fun exercise, but it also greatly contributes to our mental well-being.
This game will take us from place to place and help us achieve the fit and healthy body we’ve always desired.
Below, we’ll break it down into the six most prominent benefits of longboarding.
Heart Health
Cardio is the exercise that encourages faster heartbeats, and longboarding exactly acts as a form of cardio.
By engaging your entire body, you accelerate your heartbeat and train the cardiovascular system to be stronger.
This cardio exercise pushes your body to deliver more O2 to your body muscles and helps burn more calories during the game.
Besides improving your heart health, longboarding also develops your stamina and expands your lung capacity.
Add it to your daily workout routine if you wish to turn your longboard into an excellent cardio tool.
For instance, you can use it as a means of transportation on your everyday commute. Shorter boards are suitable for this since they’re highly portable and lightweight.
By kicking and paddling your feet simultaneously, you’re making your entire body work more intense than usual, leading to a hardcore cardio workout with a lot of fun.
Body Shape & Toning
What’s special about this game that results in an admirable body shape? You will notice that most longboard riders have highly toned muscles.
That is because the game takes extra work besides the cardio workout. You need to use your muscles to move while maintaining your balance and posture.
Gaze at the legs and arms of riders who have taken up longboarding for quite some time, and you’ll find how well carved they appear.
The legs will work extremely hard since the game requires the player to push against the ground to obtain speed.
Flexibility
Another remarkable aspect of this exercise is that the rider must be incredibly flexible. Even basic skills like sliding or carving require a particular level of fitness, balance, and flexibility.
However, flexibility is the most important quality to help you avoid injury during the game. Of course, it will take you several days or weeks to gain this.
Great flexibility helps the rider perform tricks and learn the proper ways to fall to prevent injury. Once your skills advance, your flexibility will also improve, enabling you to execute more complex moves.
Strength
Regularly practicing longboarding can help strengthen your entire body muscles. In this game, your thigh and leg strength is the game-changer.
This exercise is a total physical activity. Your quads and glutes start tightening right after you dive into the first moves.
Once you paddle down your turf, multiple muscles will kick in, including:
- obliques
- latissimus dorsi
- rectus abdominis
- the trapezius
- deltoids
- biceps
- triceps
A longboard will also wake up the sleepy abs and reinforce your core. While your legs play the prime role in riding the board, your core helps maintain the balance and handle all the maneuvers.
So, don’t be amazed if your legs feel like they’ve been going through crunches after long playing sessions.
Balance
Increased balance has to be the most apparent benefit of a longboard. If you usually have difficulty standing on a leg, this hobby can help you master it.
Hours of standing on a longboard with one leg will train your body to balance itself more effectively.
Of course, in the beginning, you’ll find that handling your body weight with one leg and two legs alternatively is not an easy task.
Coordination & Agility Skills
Longboarders who can perform tricks with their bodies’ slightest movement have superior synchronicity.
From turning to beginning and stopping, they have to engage large muscle groups and coordinate multiple groups efficiently to yield the best performances. With practice, your agility and timing will also get instantaneous.
Coordinating different muscle groups is the fundamental technique of this game, but practicing it can do wonders for your flexibility and strength.
Endurance
This street sport is incredibly challenging and exhausting. Even the fundamental step of kicking your leg against the pavement can make you sweat buckets.
What motivates you to stick to it is that it’s super cool and fun. That’s why riders can spend hours stepping on and off their boards without weariness or realizing how long they’ve spent on the workout.
You can start slow with 30-60 minutes a day to avoid forcing yourself too much and leaving little to no motivation for the next day.
With persistent practice, your endurance and skill will enhance, and you will dedicate all day long to the hobby without getting sick of it.
Can You Lose Weight By Longboarding?
This exercise can be a great idea if you attempt to lose fat and weight. Because the activity forces your entire body to work constantly, you’ll burn calories and fat, which helps you shed weight.
Research has indicated that you can lose about ½-1 pound a week if you play with your board daily, depending on your calorie consumption.
That means you can lose more pounds if you stick to a healthy, nutritious diet. A study suggested that a person can burn about 300-450 calories after an hour of longboarding.
The range varies depending on your current weight. You can burn 2000-3000 calories per week, provided you ride your board every day.
This sport is a form of exercise that makes you sweat buckets, figuratively and literally. The harder you ride and sweat, the more fat, and calories you can lose during the process.
The Bottom Line
So, is longboarding good exercise? It’s a yes for sure.
The activity offers wonderful health benefits regarding joint mobility and reinforcement, strength training, balance skills, and cardio fitness.
Hopefully, you have answered your question through the above article. If you have any questions or related content, don’t forget to leave a comment below to discuss more with us.
Thank you for your interest in the article!
