Re: Once upon a time...
Posted: Sat Jun 18, 2011 10:08 am
legal flavio!
Cool to see Rio Pics..think the half pipe shot is of Erik Wilners back yard..man that a racket!
I did ride a Kryptonics composite deck..I picked it because I did not want to get stuck in Rio with a Borken board so i traveled with an indestructable one.
Wilner made "Spectro Skates" which if I remember correctly had graphics made with black magic markers and a bunch of lines condensing to a vanishing point.
I loved to get motorcycle tow ins into Campo Grandes super long half pipe and try to do the longest grinds. I rode my custom made 8 wheeler there as well as my 48 inch long baord with 4 inch ufo's in that half pipe.
I would go to City Skateboards in NYC (My best friend's dad owned it) and buy tons of used gear and sell it in Rio.
Those bearings I rode were pretty shot... they were Sims Gold Racing bearings, I think AZF made them... not really the fastest bearings but a lot faster than what other people had at the time- I had to soup them up every weekend because of how much dust was at that skatepark..man it was hot riding in that sun.. The deck had green Sims Snake conicals and Megatrons which I ground until the axle was about to pop off. I also rode with sims gloves with green urethane tips (also picked for longevity)...ironically the very opposite of slide gloves as the fingertips and palms gripped... Tom Sims had some very weird ideas. I kept using the same set of Rector pads for about 10 more years and to this day I still use and race in the very same Jay Adams Flyaway helmet that I used since 1975 or 1976.
I would take old kryptonics and older slow urethane wheels and use a drill press with a glued in bearing on an axle as a lathe to make my own conical wheels using a wood file and sell them At Escola Americana.
That was some fast park riding we did back then.. I never see anyone riding as fast now a days as we did at campo Grande.. it was such a big wide open park with such a deep bowl with a huge transition and a bunch of vert... it was cool to be in the bottom of that bowl watching someone carve the top... But not so cool coming down that wall and trying to avoid someone at the bottom. They would never make such a huge transition with vert like that again... people would say it was unrideable.... but you could ride it perfectly well if you had about 25-30mph for speed.
You really had to work hard to ride that big terrain and maintain speed because in the 100+ degree weather with the hot hot sun beating down on the concrete... the Sims Snake conicals were not a very hard wheel and the sun and hot pavement and heat made them even softer.. plus they weren't that fast a wheel to begin with, just a hair faster than a slow road rider 4.
Still Mario was a great rider,,,and that little german kid who did inverts.Erik Wilner taught me to do roll ins when people were just starting to do them in the USA. we were all breaking our wrists at the time.. I avoided that by wearing Rector wrist guards on top (had the top plate for protection) and Hobie wristguards (bottom metal bar) under that ...which made the first modern wrist guard with both top and bottom protection...bulky, heavy and even hotter in that hot sun. Best time to ride was at night waiting for those lights to come on.
Campo was a fun park so much more fun than Jacarepaguá skate park. (spelling??) Which was nothing more than a silly frying pan.... but would pass for the typical mini transition that we ride today.. although it was a very steep sudden transition (hence frying pan).
Probably the most fun was when we would get 15-20 skaters to follow each other all at the same time in the Half pipe... sometimes we would make it to the bowl in the end of the pipe and start coming back out against the flow of all the other skaters still just entering the long half pipe... it was game of nerves (we call it "chicken" in the USA) to see who would roll out first. I think only once or twice did we all go in and all make it out with anyone bailing or rolling out. That was insanity......so many near misses... I do remember colliding into a skater named "gordo" doing that once. The times we pulled it off was like 3 minutes of constant high fives... like it was amazing to watch.
Speaking of chicken...
Another skater I remember was nicknamed galinha (chicken in english) as he looked like a chicken... he was a skater who ride with Wilner.... Also Chris Redfield from Escola Americana, and Glen Carlson from Escola Americana.
Cool to see Rio Pics..think the half pipe shot is of Erik Wilners back yard..man that a racket!
I did ride a Kryptonics composite deck..I picked it because I did not want to get stuck in Rio with a Borken board so i traveled with an indestructable one.
Wilner made "Spectro Skates" which if I remember correctly had graphics made with black magic markers and a bunch of lines condensing to a vanishing point.
I loved to get motorcycle tow ins into Campo Grandes super long half pipe and try to do the longest grinds. I rode my custom made 8 wheeler there as well as my 48 inch long baord with 4 inch ufo's in that half pipe.
I would go to City Skateboards in NYC (My best friend's dad owned it) and buy tons of used gear and sell it in Rio.
Those bearings I rode were pretty shot... they were Sims Gold Racing bearings, I think AZF made them... not really the fastest bearings but a lot faster than what other people had at the time- I had to soup them up every weekend because of how much dust was at that skatepark..man it was hot riding in that sun.. The deck had green Sims Snake conicals and Megatrons which I ground until the axle was about to pop off. I also rode with sims gloves with green urethane tips (also picked for longevity)...ironically the very opposite of slide gloves as the fingertips and palms gripped... Tom Sims had some very weird ideas. I kept using the same set of Rector pads for about 10 more years and to this day I still use and race in the very same Jay Adams Flyaway helmet that I used since 1975 or 1976.
I would take old kryptonics and older slow urethane wheels and use a drill press with a glued in bearing on an axle as a lathe to make my own conical wheels using a wood file and sell them At Escola Americana.
That was some fast park riding we did back then.. I never see anyone riding as fast now a days as we did at campo Grande.. it was such a big wide open park with such a deep bowl with a huge transition and a bunch of vert... it was cool to be in the bottom of that bowl watching someone carve the top... But not so cool coming down that wall and trying to avoid someone at the bottom. They would never make such a huge transition with vert like that again... people would say it was unrideable.... but you could ride it perfectly well if you had about 25-30mph for speed.
You really had to work hard to ride that big terrain and maintain speed because in the 100+ degree weather with the hot hot sun beating down on the concrete... the Sims Snake conicals were not a very hard wheel and the sun and hot pavement and heat made them even softer.. plus they weren't that fast a wheel to begin with, just a hair faster than a slow road rider 4.
Still Mario was a great rider,,,and that little german kid who did inverts.Erik Wilner taught me to do roll ins when people were just starting to do them in the USA. we were all breaking our wrists at the time.. I avoided that by wearing Rector wrist guards on top (had the top plate for protection) and Hobie wristguards (bottom metal bar) under that ...which made the first modern wrist guard with both top and bottom protection...bulky, heavy and even hotter in that hot sun. Best time to ride was at night waiting for those lights to come on.
Campo was a fun park so much more fun than Jacarepaguá skate park. (spelling??) Which was nothing more than a silly frying pan.... but would pass for the typical mini transition that we ride today.. although it was a very steep sudden transition (hence frying pan).
Probably the most fun was when we would get 15-20 skaters to follow each other all at the same time in the Half pipe... sometimes we would make it to the bowl in the end of the pipe and start coming back out against the flow of all the other skaters still just entering the long half pipe... it was game of nerves (we call it "chicken" in the USA) to see who would roll out first. I think only once or twice did we all go in and all make it out with anyone bailing or rolling out. That was insanity......so many near misses... I do remember colliding into a skater named "gordo" doing that once. The times we pulled it off was like 3 minutes of constant high fives... like it was amazing to watch.
Speaking of chicken...
Another skater I remember was nicknamed galinha (chicken in english) as he looked like a chicken... he was a skater who ride with Wilner.... Also Chris Redfield from Escola Americana, and Glen Carlson from Escola Americana.
