A shifty is a skateboarding move that is similar to the rewind in snowboarding. It's pretty basic, and can be added to most ollie-style tricks to show some extra flair.

How one does a shifty is simple. When in the air, as in after an ollie or getting air off a ramp, point the board off to the side just by moving your legs. Then, once the board has turned a good portion of the way to perpendicular, you bring it back to straight with your feet again, so you can land. The difference between this and a rewind is that in a rewind, your whole body rotates, while in a shifty, it's just the board and your legs that rotate.

Some people like to call it tweaking an ollie, since it has similar motion to tweaking a grab, but you don't grab it.

Shift"y (?), a.

Full of, or ready with, shifts; fertile in expedients or contrivance.

Wright.

Shifty and thrifty as old Greek or modern Scot, there were few things he could not invent, and perhaps nothing he could not endure. C. Kingsley.

© Webster 1913.