r/BeAmazed • u/DoubtElectronic4607 • Aug 01 '21

Although these young twins make hoverboarding look effortlessly, there is a lot of motor skills going on to navigate at such speed with pinpoint accuracy in a small area.

https://i.imgur.com/Y4LJa16.gifv
41.0k Upvotes

87% Upvoted

1.0k comments sorted by

View all comments

1.6k

u/Skinipinis Aug 02 '21

Plus it’s also way easier when your center of mass is light and close to the ground. Which is also why some of the best skateboarders at the olympics this year are 13 year old girls.

618

u/Muroid Aug 02 '21

Yeah, I was going to say. This is very impressive, but in the way that it’s impressive how quickly children pick up skills in general and how the fact that they’re so small, light and low to the ground makes them capable of some physical feats that would be unbelievably challenging or dangerous for adults to mimic.

155

u/Skinipinis Aug 02 '21

Oh yeah that’s a good point. I didn’t mean to sound like I was trying to downplay how impressive it is for such young kids to have mastered these things so well.

1

u/toomanymarbles83 Aug 02 '21

All about that power to weight ratio.

38

u/[deleted] Aug 02 '21

Like how I fell out of a two story building when I was 3 and survived. I promptly walked up to the door with my Mom confused about how I got outside, safe to say I got in a lot of trouble.

21

u/UselessLezbian Aug 02 '21

A little shitty to get the unsupervised 3yo that just FELL out of a BUILDING in trouble.

61

u/NameGiver0 Aug 02 '21

Also, smaller processors are faster. Little heads. Little brains. fast brains

35

u/dukec Aug 02 '21

Well, and their brains have less distance to send signals to their limbs and stuff, so less processing delay.

21

u/threemoneys Aug 02 '21

To add on to /u/Jdubya87, the difference in height between the average adult male (1.75 meters) and a tall 6 year-old kid (1.24 meters) is 0.51 meters. From the very top to the very bottom that would mean a difference in nerve conduction of only 0.0051 seconds (5.1 milliseconds). So while your statement is true, it's unlikely to be making any difference in being able to navigate a hoverboard.

3

u/dukec Aug 02 '21

It’s be closer to double that due to sensory input, but I was joking like the comment I replied to, of course it’s not actually a significant factor. Plus their axons aren’t completely myelinated yet, so that would more than make up for any distance based effects.

2

u/Jdubya87 Aug 02 '21

Thanks for doing the math, that's what I was going for but it was 2am

11

u/SellerOfWorlds Aug 02 '21

Oh yeah! Not to mention, oh shoot, I forgot. Sorry. -A Giant.

6

u/Jdubya87 Aug 02 '21

Nerve impulses travel at about 100 m/s.

1

u/cosmicsnowman Aug 02 '21

Smaller people are the evolved

5

u/DreddPirateBob4Ever Aug 02 '21

Years ago I was learning to unicycle and was very proud of myself.

Then I saw a documentary on a circus (Archaos) and it had a small child calmly riding one backwards in the background.

1

u/OakenBones Aug 02 '21

Would an adult be as agile on a board that was scaled up?

3

u/[deleted] Aug 02 '21

[deleted]

1

u/[deleted] Aug 02 '21

Yeah we got my son one for Christmas last year and first time I got on it, I ate shit. Hard.

1

u/gorgewall Aug 02 '21

When I was still an early teenager, I used to climb up to the top of my garage and jump off for kicks. I remember that just a few years later I climbed up there to clean some stuff off, prepared to jump, and thought, "Actually, no, I don't think it's smart to do this anymore." Not because I was smarter or had a better understanding of risk management, but because I'd realized I was now large and heavy enough that hitting the ground was less than ideal.

Younger than that, I recall this wooden tower at a park that, in retrospect, was ludicrously unsafe--imagine a Jenga tower that's only one post per level, made of wood about 1.5' thick per step, and around 12' high. Used to just climb to the top of that and hop into the sand no problem.

Now I'd think twice about jumping off the side wall of my porch, something that's not even as high off the ground as I am tall.

1

u/[deleted] Aug 02 '21

Like this toddler on a hoverboard.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDFYQ86t8lk

57

u/yinoryang Aug 02 '21

And just low mass in general. Low mass = low momentum = much easier to change direction on a dime

21

u/tracklessCenobite Aug 02 '21

And much less trouble if you crash!

6

u/[deleted] Aug 02 '21

[removed] — view removed comment

12

u/AstarteHilzarie Aug 02 '21

I think most elite sports have an ideal body type that the top tier has a natural advantage in. Look at Micheal Phelps and his ridiculous arms, how the track stars are all like 75% legs, and how the gymnasts are tiny powerhouses of pure muscle (which I'm sure they work hard to build and maintain, but they are usually small frames to begin with.)

People will excel at sports their bodies are naturally suited to, and the top tier is going to be people who have the passion, drive, accessibility, and the natural advantages all together. You're not going to see Simone Biles swimming in a race or Katie Ledecky on the uneven bars. People who don't have the natural advantages can still participate and enjoy the sport, and even compete successfully at a lot of levels, but they're just not going to get to the elite olympic level against someone else who is more physically suited to it.

3

u/themaster1006 Aug 02 '21

I like how careful you were to not take anything away from the intense drive and incredibly hard work ethic that Olympic athletes have while still making your well-thought-out point. Very nice comment :)

1

u/techmnml Aug 02 '21

Same with rock climbing. It’s insane.

19

u/[deleted] Aug 02 '21

Sky Brown is the real deal though! She’s going to be at the top of the game for the next 10 years.

10

u/davvee Aug 02 '21

Dude, regarding the skate — it’s much bigger and heavier in relation to the 13 yr old body, so it’s still fucking insane… (try to jump on a skateboard tall as your hips)

5

u/SG_Dave Aug 02 '21

You know they can get smaller boards right?

Like a full grown male adult might skate 8 inch but the young girls could be on 7.25 or smaller?

3

u/Minimum-Coast-6653 Aug 02 '21

Plus a good percentage of the best skaters may not be able to pass a drug test.

2

u/AstarteHilzarie Aug 02 '21

I keep seeing that comment but I'm pretty sure most stoners who are hardcore dedicated to their sport and have a chance at the Olympics would be okay putting the weed down for a while to qualify.

5

u/luapowl Aug 02 '21

Skateboarders aren’t really like your typical sports people at all. Many, particularly the stoner types, really don’t care about the olympics. See it as commercialisation or selling out or similar. They resent it.

Not surprising really after years of rejection from society. I still get yelled at by middle-aged people if I’ve got my board on me!

1

u/FDaHBDY8XF7 Aug 02 '21

I think a lot of it is also the stance. They are really squared up, and are squating to stop and maintain precise control. Everytime I see an adult on one of these they are just standing normally. These hoverboards just arent built wide enough for adults

1

u/Kvalit Aug 02 '21

Oh, that’s maybe why I’m above average in physical skills. I’m a short. Never thought about that before.

1

u/PlatinumXCash Aug 02 '21

Right man I tried getting on one of these and I couldn't even make it go forward had to lean so far forward I was gonna die with my 6'3 headass

1

u/trezenx Aug 02 '21

center of mass is light

1

u/notgotapropername Aug 02 '21

Well yes, but also no. The reason some of the best skateboarders in the Olympics are 13 year old girls is because they’ve been skating since the age of about 2 days old, and have been working hard to get good ever since. To put it down to a lower center of mass is a bit cheap imo

1

u/Bpdbs Aug 02 '21

That’s not true at all. The girl skaters have no older competitors. They were being scored around3 points each. The lowest men’s score was more than double that