Slalom was hijacked...........

[Rick Stanziale]

Wesley, I hear the same thing from the "used to skate" crowd. But don't forget I've got two kids and they are as much an inspiration to continue skateboarding as that undefinable desire that burns deep with inside all of us.

Gilmour, I don't think it's possible to go back and envision skateboarding without banks, pools and vert riding.

I just can't imagine the number of people over the age of 21 who'll join the ranks of slalom racing without any prior skateboard experience as being the bulk of new blood. Should we encourage crossover? Absolutely. Just as fervently as we encourage younger skaters to race.

[Eric Groff]

JG-That was great post, boy did Claude take your original post WAY OUT OF CONTEXT! Slalom can be done by just about anybody, I get so stoked on people like the Gordan Clan, that went from spectator at the 2001 Worlds to hard Chargin Slalom afficianodos, Lauren and Dylan Blew me away yesterday Charging a hill that was fast and gnarley. Howard came out to WLAC last year and Charged the big hill, I wanted to tell him that I didnt think his skills were good enough to go down a hill that could really hurt him, but he was goin for it and put in a formidable performance. Its people like that with dedication and drive that will grow slalom, not to mention HG putting his money where his mouth is and diving head first into a major slalom company.
OH CANADUH-Again I beat you fair and square plain and simple, Go talk to the timer,promotor,score keeper if you got a problem, I dont remember your version one bit, I rememeber I advanced you didnt, BOO HOO. After over a year your still whining about 1 race you lost......... Dude I have raced in over 25 races in the last 2 years, everybody looses, to piss,moan,whine and cry about it aint get get you nowhwere, SHOW UP AND RACE.
Brian-The band I seen was around 1982 at a dingee little club in LA, It was a put together little side project by some local So Cal Punk Alumni.

[John Gilmour]

The other question I have in mind is this hypothetical one. If there were no banked playgrounds in California schools, and no drought, ie...vert never came into being....

Where would skateboarding be today? Dead, alive and well, mutated?

[John Gilmour]

Well What I meant to say is that Slalom skateboarding still continued to exist to the skaters who owned slalom decks. The Skateboard media had "tunnel vision" in regards to promoting vert skating.
To any new entrant to the sport of skateboarding slalom ceased to exist- regardless of whether or not slalom equipment manufacturers made gear.

I watched a similar thing happen in snowboarding where the snowboarding media took a stance to reduce/flat out eliminate...any carving shots made on alpine gear.

For the vast majority of snowboarders out there...most simply carve down teh hill racing along with their friends. A few hit the ocassional jump or take a few runs ina terrrain park per season. The remaining minority of snowboarders -MINORITY- spend the bulk of their time in terrain parks.

IT doesn't take much statistics work to figure it out. You merely look at the amount of terrain park percentage per acre (and that the terrain parks are not very crowded except on holiday weekends)-the number of snowboarders as a percentage of total numbers of people and the total lift tickets sold. The vast majority of snowboarders merely cruise down the hill carving and skidding turns. That same vast majority would be better served either riding boardercross gear or Alpine snowboarding gear as opposed to twin tip or directional freeride boards.

My feelings were that in the 1970's the bulk of the skateboarders were this type of demographic- cruisers who did the occasional jump, freestyle move, or bombed a hill or ran a slalom course. Most just skated around their neighborhood coasting down the local hill.

Mind you the gear then was pretty dangerous. Try riding a Hang Ten down a steep hill with no grip tape, or going over 30mph on a 24 inch fibreflex.

What happened to these people?

AS Wesley said a good number of them got married had kids, or if they were more hardcore had kids. Of my Guy friends that are near 40 and have kids over the age of 14 I can say with complete certainty that none of them carry less than 20 percent body fat. So for those athletics certainly isn't high on their priority list. Paying bills, staying afloat, buying a bigger house/car/second home/pool are.

The cool thing about slalom is that you do not have to be in good shape to race and turn in a good time. Or to have a good time for that matter. Weight helps with grip. And according to traditional physics for obects traveling on a straight line with respect to gravity no "work" is done. So having a few extra pounds doesn't penalize you as much a it would in Freeclimbing.

So Wesley- those old friends might feel motivated to race if they knew the gear was better and that they could still be competitive.

The bigger question I am asking is...
If slalom is fun
If it is easy to learn
If it is exciting to the participants

How many people could we expect to slalom given the below criteria?

1. A good set up (Fibreflex, G-trucks, Abec11 Stingers can be had for under $120.
2. It is a good low impact quick workout (screw tai-bo)


The things I see against slalom are perceptions by the majority of the american public.

1. Skateboarding is not for adults- it is a kids only or immature/vandal activity.

2. Skateboarding is dangerous (a friend of a friend of mine broke his arm once in 1976 while being towed behind a car- I'll stick to "safe rollerblading" (actually far more dangerous)

3. I don't want to be identified with the skateboarder image.

4.I'll look stupid.



Possible benefits to the person who takes up slalom skateboarding.

1. Very inexpensive sport- cheaper than running shoes or a health club.

2. Cardio vascular benefits

3.Load bearing sport will help prevent osteoporosis in females.

4. It will help my snowboarding/skiing/wakeboarding/kiteboarding/surfing/etc. in the offseason

5. No travel required as opposed to the aforementioned sports- also no lift ticket costs.

6. Social benefits (We are all such a great group of guys)

7. Improves flexibility as well as several otehr aspects of fitness.

8. Gains in health and performance can be measured with a clock.

9. Provided a good smooth consistent grippy surface is used and appropriate protective gear is worn you are unlikely to be badly injured. Of course should you be at a race and through good sense out the window....well at least it isn't as bad as crashing your car. Slalom skateboarding is one of the safer sports provided the surface is good, course reasonable for the skill level, and you skate with your head not over it.

[Claude Regnier]

Arab what's Canada got to do with other then me being Canadian.

I guess your still drikng and never stopped if you don't remeber get smoked in the second run. Unfortunataly in trying to make up the 1.5 DQ time I hit 7 cones.

You were approximately 30 to 40 FEET behind at the finnish. It wasn't even close. The numbers of cones I hit discouraged me from checking times to see if I'd advanced. I guess I should have anyway. it's nice of you to try and cover now while some of the memories of others may be faint.

You've stated several times you don't drink or smoke. Is it old age causing this lapse of memory.

The only run you beat me to the line on (narrowly) was your false start. Remember trying to blow thru the gate? On the rerun i passed around the 7th cone(after you got a good start) and missed a cones a little later.

Henry was not the time keeper or scorer he was racing. That is not even worth going into just like you bringing up the events of 86'.

Wesley on the brightside my grandson will be able to race against the arrivals. I'm looking forward to it!

[Brian Morris]

On 2003-02-02 02:32, ARAB wrote:
I seen this band one night do covers of famous patriotic songs, all punk rock versions, They did the Ballad of the Green Beret, I'm a Flag waving fool, and I nearly cried every song after song it was so good.

What band was this? I gotta see this!! When it comes to Patriotism and Punk Rock, I'm definately in. Arab, are you familiar with the Bodies? Listen to the song We Fly the Flag!

Anyway, on subject... It does seem kind of odd as a younger member of the slalom community that almost everybody is married or has kids. I guess to some folks my age, it could seem that slalom is more of a gentlemans club rather than a kids club house. But, never have I met a group of more open and amazing people, and never have I been more accepted into a skateboarding scene. Maybe I'm different than most skaters my age, maybe because I find it more amazing to see somebody pull a Philips 66 at the lip of the pool, or see somebody throw a nice coleman slide, or somebody make a sick tight course clean for the first time, rather than Tony Hawk doing 900's all day, or somebody pull a kickflip/backflip/360 indy/to 5-0 grind/to triple lindy out. (rodney dangerfield refrence!)

Proud to say I know you all!
Brian

[Eric Groff]

I seen this band one night do covers of famous patriotic songs, all punk rock versions, They did the Ballad of the Green Beret, I'm a Flag waving fool, and I nearly cried every song after song it was so good.

[Wesley Tucker]

No, but I do know all the words to Sgt. Barry Sadler's "The Ballad Of The Green Beret!"

[Eric Groff]

OH CANADA-Reread my post, I didnt say FCR ran La Costa, if you got a problem talk to the Promotor, HESTER. No you did no beat me to the line, maybe you should cut back on the drinking, I think your memeory is impaired.

WES-The Cowsills, geez you are old, Do you sing that song "Give me a head with hair, long beutiful hair" I DO!

[Wesley Tucker]

Gilmour said, "Slalom scenes popped up from time to time. Wesley Tucker competed in tons of slalom competitions which were not covered in the general skate media."

John,

Believe it or not, I've actually contacted some of my old slalom mates from the '70s. Some are alumni of my university, some I went to high school with and 7 or 8 I have e-mails.

Guess what? They are all pretty much my age, all are married, all have kids and all are in the second decade of jobs they started right after or soon after school. The answer I get from all of them is pretty much the same: "ARE YOU NUTS? I can't afford to miss work with a broken (leg, arm, shoulder, wrist, insert whatever appendage works here.)" Even health insurance and all the assurances in the world that we're riding mellow hills and courses just leaves them saying, "nah, that was fun when I was a kid, but if I got a free weekend, I'm taking out the kids in the boat!"

Which reminds me: have you noticed how many of the people we skate with are either childless or just recent parents? Claude, Geezer, C-Money and Curt K. are notable exceptions. (Was it Geezer-X who brought his daugher to the Gathering? I remember a little girl and small boy being there, but I'm not exactly sure of who the father is?) But look at the usual suspects of East Coast racing: you, me, TK, BP, ur13, Noah, Vlad, lbk, WesE, Eric Moore, GBJ, Ohm, (I think Ohm? I've never heard him mention kids.) Do KMG and Yvonne have any children? Or PADan? I've never met their kids if they have any. Anyway, notice how many have no family, are "just married," or have new family with newborns in the house (Tway and lbk, of course.) (I would say Slappy, but I really know nothing about the guy. For all I know he's single or has five wives in three states and more kids than the Cowsills!)

Here we are in our 30s and 40s, and so many of us have never made the decision to either marry or even more demanding have kids. It'll be interesting to see how the demands of family and children in the coming years affect everyone's ability to participate in our peculiar but exciting little sport.

So when you ask, "who hijacked slalom?" I would say two of the suspects are . . . the birds and the bees!

Know what I mean?

[Claude Regnier]

FCR didn't run LA Costa. By the time I noticed the error it was too late anyways.

On our way back up the we chatted and i didn't figure I had beaten you by enough so it never bothered croosed mt mind until I seen the recorded errors.

By the way I don't complain much at all. West Virginia is a case and point. Your recent comments just went a little overboard and your attacks although general in nature ar just bullshit and in poor taste.

I guess that is just your way,EH!

[Eric Groff]

Claude go have another drink bro!

Keep complaining about what everybody else is doing, better yet instead of that, why dont you do something about it.

Its so cute how people with no clue about what is happening in slalom racing is complaining the most.

What did FCR do to you, what did I do to you, You have done it all to your self Claude.

I beat you fair and square in LC, Tough Shit, you got a problem take it up with the promotors. Yeah thats right the ones that hold the key to your future. Dont complain to much.

OH CANADUH

[Claude Regnier]

Arab unfortunately you are as blind as a bat. Had you been to that race you would have it was the same for everybody and the rest was just bullshit.

Were talking Slalom here not events. By the way I made 3 events last year in cali. Then there was ny first race in 11 years where unfortunately (right after I passed u like u were standing still) I dq'd. Unfirtunately or conveniently they made a mistake in recording the times of our second run and we'll never if you actually beat me but de'ms da brakes.

It's funny but no one at was at the race in 86 will step up and say anything other then the one person who'm I respect the most in the Slalom World and he and I spoke at La Costa. There was no longer any doubt. Just imagine if I would have some experience in 86.

If u didn't have that crew pulling u ?

As far as JG's thread he was talking about a form of killing Slalom. What I mentioned has a bearing. Tossing you're name in there well, it was long overdue. Your continued facts stating as you like to call will certainally kill some of the interest generated in Slalom. Oh yes but it will keep u closer to the top a little while longer.

[Eric Groff]

Claude-I dont see what your post has to do with what Gilmour started, if it is a half ass attempt to get me to set the record straight, then let me.
I can only speak for myself here, I traveled to 6 different states in 3 different time zones in the last year to compete in 13 different skateboarding events, nobody paid for these trips but me. So what is the point you are trying to make anyways?, that California skaters dominate, and we hold the key to slalom. The record speaks for itself I dont need to add to it, but let me if I will, How many out of staters or foriegners have won a MAJOR Pro race? 1 John Gilmour. How many Promotors put on Major Pro Races? 1 FCR? Who wins every Major Pro race? Californians(with the exception of the JG win).

I remember the time that some Canadien guy won a race over a couple Californians, His canadien buddy was holding the stop watch.

Why is it that East Coasters and foriegners are always trying to make it an East Coast vs West Coast thing. The fact is, it is a West Coast thing, and you are just riding our coatails. If you got a problem with what West Coasters are doing then do something besides complain about it, This whole thing started here, then and now.

So what was the point you were trying to make Claude? Because I just see some guy sitting behind a computor that came to 2 Major Pro races complaining about what everybody else is doing.

[Claude Regnier]

So this all leads to an interesting question. It has a relation to Arab's (God Like posts on da oder site) once the West Coasters start to get their asses kicked again are they going to packup the store again.

We know that only a few will spend their own dime and take time to attend events outside of cozy little Cali. unless it's payed for of course.

I don't mean to continue a war (I really think he's an unfortunate soul (and his buddies must cringe at times) but it all relates to post I made shortly after finding out about the resurgence in 2000.

Let's not lose control of it this time and allow the same guys who used us and abandoned us take over. For ________sake they even did their best not to show our continued enjoyment and burry us.

Sorry but that felt really good.

[Rick Stanziale]

700,000?

699,642 of which don't skate anymore

I'd feel pretty confident in saying that 90% of the racers in the 35-50 demographic have been flushed out via the internet.

If you've never skated vert, you can't relate - but the definition of skateboarding will always feature roundwall, racing will be an "also ran".

That doesn't mean we can't develop a first class racing circuit that fosters the development of new racers.

In the 70's, I rode my skateboard down the street for transportation to skate a pool, took the same board downhill as I raced my friends, and used the same deck for freestyle. Pool riding is enjoying a resurgence in popularity because kids can use the same deck they already have for street (which is more closely related to freestyle).

Luge and stand up downhill have been in the limelight longer than slalom in recent years, but you don't see kids flocking to those disciplines.

Why?

I think it's the specialized equipment.

Kids bomb hills all day long on newschool decks, but they have no interest in going out and buying a street luge.

Fifteen minutes are almost up.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Rick Stanziale on 2003-02-01 14:01 ]</font>

[John Gilmour]

Well it didn't take much for GBJ to find a wealth of Oldschool skateboarders who were willing to slalom- a few weeks in a "park and ride" lot.

Most of these skaters were happy to be able to slalom again- of the ones who slalomed before like Mitch T.

Wesley Tucker, Mandarino, Marck McCree, Keith Hollien and others were unearthed.

How many more of us are there?

Let's take a look back. The Years 1974-1978.

I remember seeing a statistic (and we all know how accurate those are) that there were 20 million skateboarders in the USA. Well lets assume that the figure is off by a factor of 10. Make that 2 million skateboarders.

Skateboards were sold all over. You could get them in big box stores, you could buy them in toy stores, you could buy them in ski shops, you could buy them in sporting goods shops, you could buy them at the general store......I even remember a stationary store carrying skateboard gear.

In the beginning skateboards were just cruisers. Then the kicktail made them available for freestyle. As gear diversified skaters who could not afford a quiver had to make a choice. Cruiser/Slalom, Freestyle.

Downhill wasn't really an option for most skaters.

In places like La Costa California we saw a lot of people choose downhill and slalom to suit the terrain- not a lot of flat area there.

In places in the Midwest freestyle and slalom (flatland slalom- or slalom on slight hills)was the choice to make.

On the East Coast freestyle and slalom were the main choices.

As skateboarder magazine began to showcase Vert riding and the vert hardcore lifestyle a few things were apparent to the publishers. More brands meant more advertising revenue. In racing you can only support a few brands- the fastest 3 brands, and a few "Also rans".

However freestyle could support hundreds of different manufacturers and the corresponding hundreds of pages of advertising. Vert was the same.

Vert with its sensational appeal and the idea that it was "impossible" got Nearly ALL the media attention. California with its lack of rain and temperate climate was an ideal place for skateparks to be built (UHHHH until California lawyers got involved).

However the rest of the country did not share southern California's weather system (the rest of the world for that matter). An outdoor skatepark in the midwest or East coast would only have a few months to make money- as well as needing repair due to bad weather.

Shops only wanted to carry what was "hot". And the thought of getting stuck with an outdated slalom deck was not high on their list.

So a band vert skatebarders and the media ran off with skateboarding as the rest of the world knew it. In the skateboard media flatland freestyle and slalom ceased to exist. Lack of video support did not help slalom as vert lends itself well to still photos and slalom did not (Exception the BP and HH pictorials with multiple exposures) As the parks closed sales for park decks collapsed.

Outside of California, Skateboarding, which was once found on every USA neighborhood street from 3-6pm, disappeared after 1978. it went indoors to the parks- out of the public's eye. "If the public doesn't see IT-they don't even know that they want IT."

Not all skaters were served with skateparks. Many lived in areas with no parks within a 4 hour radius. Only the few skaters with cars who lived within 30 minutes of a park could hope to skate everyday- unless their lives revolved around skating as a pro.

So what happened to all these skaters......all these slalom skaters? 2 - 20 million skaters of which many owned slalom decks?

Fibreflex sold a lot of decks and at one time or another nearly every manufacturer offered a slalom deck.

After the media focused on vert- where did these skaters go?

All the skaters I knew still rode their slalom decks- but the interest to skate slalom faded where there were no competitions.

In California- there was a tendancy to announce skate competitions after they happened. There was a lot of secrecy and "invitation only" events (this according to BT). It made it nearly impossible for a local kid to practice slalom on his street- and then go out to California to race.

Remember how high airfares were in the 1970's if you did not buy them with 90-60-30 days advance notice? It was a small fortune.

So I have to wonder where the concentration of slalom decks were sold.

Some strange stats.

Bob told me he shipped tons of decks to Britain and also sold 2000 decks he made under the "Double deck" name to Holland.

Tons of decks ended up on the other side of the iron curtain.

Slalom scenes popped up from time to time. Wesley Tucker competed in tons of slalom competitions which were not covered in the general skate media.

How could we find these skaters?

Lastly......
If we could assume that in 1974-1978 about 30% of the riders owned a slalom deck then 30% of the people drawn to "sidewalk surfing" (as skateboard was Sidewalk surfing back then) we could assume that almost the same proportion of the population today might be interested in slaloming.

How many people is this?