Skateboard appreciation thread - stories and videos

DesVegas

I'm 40 now and still consider myself a skater even though ive only ridden one once or twice in the last year.

Luckily one of our crew liked to build ramps and he had one is his back garden.

Other than that we used to jump the train down to the stevenage park and to knebworth and also down to brixton.

I always used to hurt myself street skating, mainly due to stones, although i did break my wrist skating handrails in the rain so i only skate mini ramps and bowls.

Rick McCrank ftw!

bingefeller

I used to skate in the late 1980s right up until around 2000.  I still have my Anti-Hero board.   Still have my VHS videos too.  Used to love the music on those videos.  Sadly the skating scene around Belfast was nowhere near what it was on the UK mainland back then.  

musteatbrain

I miss skating. I had a Vallely Barnyard until last year until I realised how many pedals it was worth. I'd love to be able to take it up again and not break any bones

bingefeller

Did any of you guys have a Variflex board?  I had this Variflex board that had flourescent yellow grip tape and the board was painted grey wood.  On the back it had a street scene painted on it.  I'd love to see pictures of it again...

PolarityMan

Does playing ridiculous amounts of tony hawks count?

samzadgan

bingefeller;566854" said:

Did any of you guys have a Variflex board?  I had this Variflex board that had flourescent yellow grip tape and the board was painted grey wood.  On the back it had a street scene painted on it.  I'd love to see pictures of it again...

Yeah...first board was a purple and yellow veriflex...that thing was wide and heavy...cant believe i use to get that fucker off the ground in an ollie!

samzadgan

This was not only one of the best soundtracked skate vids when i was young...but this ramp scene with Hosoi was my main inspiration...

duotone

I absolutely love the Epicly Later'd skateboard series http://www.vice.com/series/epicly-later-d , once in a while I have a quick look at http://www.thrashermagazine.com to check out what new video clips they have uploaded onto their site

samzadgan

duotone said:

I absolutely love the Epicly Later'd skateboard series http://www.vice.com/series/epicly-later-d , once in a while I have a quick look at http://www.thrashermagazine.com to check out what new video clips they have uploaded onto their site

thats really cool man thanks for posting that link...just watched the Hosoi/Gonz interview on Vice

west

1977  G+S fibre-flex deck , asc 580 trucks , kryptonics 70mm blue bowl riders ..... still have it and cruise it ! today G+S 44 pintail longboard , holey trucks (from gavin ) Bennet 71 alligators .... no tricks anymore but still love to cruise ......

west

my era ......

bingefeller

I remember when I first saw this in 1994...I'd never seen anything like this with a skateboard before:

DesVegas

My first board was a variflex squirm and epically later'd is a great series, the heath kirchart interviews are particually good.

bingefeller

Does anyone remember "Rad", which later became "Sidewalk Surfer" magazine?

duotone

bingefeller said:

Does anyone remember "Rad", which later became "Sidewalk Surfer" magazine?

No I dont remember it being called Rad, i only remember it as Sidewalk Surfer.  Thinking back I can remember all of the "Reaction" skate brand deck adverts.

axisus

Never did the slateboard thing but I was a street skater with roller hockey boots thought the 80s and 90s. In my 50s now but I still dust them off sometimes in the summer. I can still skate backwards at speed. A few years ago my youngest daughter was still using a push chair and we used to shoot up the park like a train! I got lots of funny looks!

DesVegas

How about skate action magazine? i was in R.A.D. at the side of the ramp watching chris miller blasting a frontside air at stevenage

samzadgan

that Rodney Mullen clip is ridiculous...amazing how far ahead he was over 20 years ago.

also love how the bones brigade video highlighted how ignored yet important mullen was to where skating is today...probably the most important member of the group...yet back in the day he would get the shortest time on the videos

bingefeller

samzadgan said:

that Rodney Mullen clip is ridiculous...amazing how far ahead he was over 20 years ago.

also love how the bones brigade video highlighted how ignored yet important mullen was to where skating is today...probably the most important member of the group...yet back in the day he would get the shortest time on the videos

Yeah.  When I got that video I watched that clip so many times.  You're right, it still is amazing.  

Sambostar

Skating died when every deck became a Vision Double Vision, you could no longer get wide Indy trucks or vert boards, people started doing silly freestyle stuff like that and the council, who were forever destroying your miniramps and getting the police on you for smith grinding the flowerbed raised boarders in your day, decided that kids needed a ramp and not just one, loads of them, everywhere for everyone, often two or three quality council built ramps for every small town with hips and everything.

Kids today don't know they are born and the worst of it is, they are too busy with their computer games and phones to use them.

Wasted generation.

I'm 6' 2 what am I gonna do with one of those tiny boards?

Neeeeeerrrrr