“I love skateboarding so much, I wish it would die.”
~ Jason Jessee
They have a caster in between each set of trucks that protrude just a little bit lower than the main wheels such that whenever the board is transitioning between leaning each way there is a moment where the main wheels aren’t touching and the thing just slides…sort of directionlessly. This means you can’t really go straight, you have to be constantly carving.
Nearly broke my goddamn wrists trying this a few times before giving up. Stupid, I know. Snowboard experience helps, I was told. The bindings are just sort of plastic cuffs that are open to the middle of the board that you can wedge your feet into/against. Anyway, it looks fantastic, but like most things that do…caution.
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Quadzooks!
All board sports started with surfing. And surfing begat skateboarding, which begat snowboarding which lent some of its standup technique back to longboarding, which has been around since the 60s. Like any evolution, it’s not a chain, it’s a bush. But really, these slides are now the basic moves of a lot of longboarders these days, many of whom have never been near snow. it’s not snowboard technique, it’s longboarding. I know a lot of groms who’ve pretty much never even put their hands down, and gone straight to stand-up slides. They’re freakishly good, all those kids. You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.
One point of reference for the bush: Dogtown & Z-Boys
I always think BB should be a kind of cultural treasure trove.
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Another point is Cliff Coleman, who pioneered the sliding techniques shown in the Bones Brigade clip. Longish interview here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owBqVP2kMJU but a google will turn up all sorts of cool images and videos.
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I love surfing but live in London - hard to get to good surf. Been carveboarding to keep the legs up, but this summer finally watched Dogtown. Jeez but jeez, out came the skateboards for the local park. What a blessing!
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Thanks!!
I skydive and ride hard-tail motorcycles, but to get me to do this you’d have to wrap me in bubble wrap and an adult diaper.
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As awesome as it is, I’d hate to be driving and squash someone like this when they fly through a stop sign going 30mph.
Y’see now, skydiving’s one of those activities I’m kind of keeping reserved for the moment I really need to do it. Looks awesome, but … with few comparable experiences, I have no real reference point for what it’s like. It seems so … other-worldly.
If you’re asthmatic, I’d recommend taking a puff of your emergency inhaler first. I spent the first minute on the initial tandem jump trying to catch my breath.
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Wow - that must have been a glorious moment!
I would assume much better than the moment than the one a former roommate described to me, of how she vomited on the way down.
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Oh dear. Was it a tandem dive??
Oh yes. Her husband says she will never skydive again.
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You’ve made my day. It’s been a tough day, but that story somehow leavened it. Awful of me, I know.
The folks I know are actually incredibly safety conscious. Typically, if there was a stop sign on the run, someone would down there, giving a go/no go signal to the rider. But that said, yeah, it’s hard for everyone when there’s an accident.
Russ Howell!
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They are riding Pigs… not banana boards.
