The Unnerving Peace and Nose-Grab Insanity.

Time has a habit of flying by these days.  It's been over a week since Johners and I got soaked to the skin at Stockwell only minutes after arriving for a relaxed skate, the day before the Annual Stockwell Jam.

The place was deserted and considering it was a bank holiday Saturday, it was strangely unnerving.  Of course, the benefit was that we almost had the place to ourselves, apart from James McLean and Stevie T. fresh from his power move onto the roster of INSANE skateboards.

If you're not aware of the place in UK skateboarding history that the INSANE brand holds, you could do worse that go and check out the website. 

INSANE HISTORY

For now, here's a photo of Stevie showing how Insane wood can put you up in the rarefied air above the bowl section at London's best skatepark.

See you out there.

[LIALC]

Some Horsing Around with James

You've probably noticed that as you go through life you will come across two types of people;  those who are doers, and those who don't.  James is a doer.  Quite a good one too.

He's the man behind Horse Zine, a hand screened DIY and Skateboarding Zine that he's recently stepped up to produce his complete book that looks at all aspects of the DIY skateboard culture, which I'm sure he's saved me a copy, but more about that when he finally agrees terms to come and do an interview for the Lizard In A Lab Coat blog.

For now James is helping me drag out last Saturday's Kennington photos.  I shot this in the middle of a little corner session that James and Questions where having, both coming at it from opposite directions and both getting the travelling tricks they were after. Unfortunately I didn't get Questions lip-slide but I stopped chatting long enough to grab James's Crail Slide.

I'll give you all the details of Jame's book and his other DIY projects when he has a chance to talk to [LIALC] ... James?

See you out there.

[LIALC]

Danger Taking Advantage

After the recent long gaps between posts, I've decided to hold a couple of bits back.  In reality I just didn't have time to sort them out quickly enough so when people started pestering to see photos I figured I'd make sure they got posted via this here blog.... everyone's happy.

Here's a little sequence of Alan "Danger" Christensen recreating a much loved line that has survived the re-vamp at Kennington.  Mixing the old with the new is always a romantic proposition and this time it looks like it's paid off.

The original "DIY" quarter-thing had a lot of "Personality" and this recreation has managed to retain some of the original's unique characteristics, which the guys who did the work should get a good old pat on the back.

Of course I've yet to skate it, but that will happen soon enough.

That's your lot for now.

See you out there.

[LIALC]

A Slight Return to Kennington Sun

This happens with blogs, by that I mean it happens with THIS blog. I'm talking about the long gaps. Between posts.  It's never deliberate, things just happen that way.  I'm not going to go into the reasons for this most recent period of dead-air but it's a combination of injury and biblical weather, suffice to say I ain't been skating much.

Thankfully Jamie Harrison got my attention on friday with a message about having a skate to Celebrate the Hippy's (Johners) birthday, that he had kept pretty damn quiet, Johners that is.  This kind of occasion would usually mean a session at Stockwell but a recently revamped Kennington had just been returned to a skateable condition thanks to the eventual installation of a drain. Yep, a drain, singular. I know, me too.

I'd just kind of imagined a bowl that big would need more than one, but that remains to be seen and so far THE DRAIN was doing what is paid for and the standing water, that had caused a certain amount of blood pressure increase in the South london Skate community, was gone. Now a distant memory.... so no real need to post this...

Since when did I need real reasons to do anything?

There are going to e many more conversations in the near future about brands like Nike and Converse getting involved in skateboarding and what that means to us in the short term and long term, if what I hear is true.  More on that when it happens.

But for now, here are some photos documenting a brief explosion of sun in this dark and grim June.

More crap from me soon, see you out there.

[LIALC]

Harry in search of some frontside shade.

Questions to fakie

Birthday-Boy just hanging around in the melancholy position

Alan taking his 5-O of the end of the re-creation of the old quarter-thing.

Johners and Craig talk late 80s Hip-Hop.

Some front-side action from Mr. Gold.

Willis going long distance from the funny quarter.

I Put My Back-out Amidst A Photo Black-out.

I'm not a fan of the "text only" blog post.  But there is a very good reason for this one.  Secrecy, and lots of it.

I've talked about the etiquette of secret spots and DIY builds before and I'm not going to go over old ground here but, that's right, BUT it would seem that not all skaters in the UK read this blog, a revelation that rocked me to my core.  How do I know this? 

I know it because of our recent escapades at the new Secret Spot.  A combination of a poor grasp of the etiquette and the introduction of the interwebs and associated social media has had blood pressures rising and stern words a-spoken.

I was going to bring you images of the spot depicting the leaps and bounds in construction that happened on Saturday and even more that went down on Saturday. Unfortunately we are now on a photo-blackout.  Hence all the words.

So with no visuals for your eye-balls it leaves me only one course of action.  To moan about my bad back.  It'll get you too you know.  I was very smug about back pain when I was younger, I was a very flexible teenager, as my golf swing proved, and bad backs were what lazy, inactive people got as karma for being lazy, inactivate and quite possibly fat. Now I know better.

My back's taken a beating over the years, like most skaters, just think of all the times you've landed on your coccyx.  This Saturday I learnt that crouching on my knees hammering away at a concrete floor with a masonry chisel and a flimsy hammer for an hour or so can have an even more devastating effect on my back. Since the hard labour of Saturday I've been walking like the worst kind of incontinent pensioner and, of course, unable to skate.

This is where I finally get round to making my point.  Skateboarding is amazing, we all know that.  Building something to skate is even more amazing.  Crippling yourself building something to skate is still amazing because pain is temporary. I'm gutted I won't be able to skate for a week or so but knowing what is in the works at the spot totally makes up for it.  If my back goes once we're finish and it's ready to shred,  I may well be less philosophical about it.

Look after your back kids.... Pah, as if you're going to listen to me?

[LIALC]

P.S.  bend zee kneez!!

The Candle-light Session - Secret Spot

I've been meaning to get these up for a while now, got loads going on at the moment so it's only now that they make it onto the world wide web.

These shots were taken before the clocks went forward so we were arriving at te spotin the dark and having to get light any way we could. Head-torches, wind-up lamps, bicycle lights and candles were all being employed in a desperate attempt to light the place enough to skate it safely.  We failed.

It was lit, a bit, just not enough.  The bottom of the quarter-pipe had just been skimmed to meet the floor and the thin section at the floor started to crack up and finally big enough chunks were coming up to throw me into the face of the hip opposite.  There really isn't a lot of time to take evasive action.

Johners and James kept on shredding until we'd finished the beers and the candles were fading.

Since these pictures were taken there have been big steps forward and hopefully I can get down to help out again soon.  But for now you can all take a look at how things looked a week or so ago.

Go build something to skate.

[LIALC]

Nocturnal Bristol DIY Fun.

It's been a while since I made it down to Bristol for a skate.  This time round it was a flying visit, driving down on Saturday morning and back on Sunday afternoon.  After hanging out with the family Plews, it was time for Dave and I to head to Daveside, his new DIY spot.

Joxa with a RnR Slide going that way >

Habgood had a face full of snot so it was just Me, Joxa and Dave that made it down to the amazing little spot.  I'd seen a few photos but none of them really did justice to just how good this spot is.  The location is amazing, right by a vast expanse of smooth tarmac with superb lights all the way along the side. 

Dave had spotted the location ages ago and had tried to get people to get something started down there without success.  Then he decided to take the bull by the hors and started building the first quarter with rubble, as soon it started to look like something was possible people started being available to help out.  There have been hic-ups along the way, some loose lipped moments had the place open for business way before Dave would have liked, as is often the case with these things, and several bags of out of date concrete at a pound each later... you have what yu see in these photos.

Dave retaliates with an RnR slide coming this way.

The transitions are by no means perfect and the surface is showing signs of being a little to thin but Dave and the crew are going to resurface what's here before starting on the expansion programme.  The concrete structure that they've build up against is like a gnarly gift from the skateboard gods.  it's topped off with angle iron that has some heavy duty bolts, nails and rivets protruding out here and there, making for some interesting grinds.  A few backside grinds had me tipped to the floor, who knows what stopped the grind but each time the effect was the same, me on the floor.

Tail blockage.

Dave and Joxa were having it.  They both paid no attention to the holes and rough patches and just shredded for the couple of hours that we were there, luckily an ankle roll for me made me pick up the camera a bit earlier than usual.

Joxa

Dave

 Hopefully the next time I make it down I can lend a hand with the next stage of the build and skate it without hurting myself.  Thanks to Dave for the invite and to both Dave and Joxa for a really fun skate.

So if you are reading this and thinking "I could build something like that", YES, you can, just buy the concrete and have a go, that's exactly what Dave and the crew did.

Build it, skate it!

[LIALC]