The Skyline Sun
Sk8boardingWednesday, November 04, 2009 By Casey Angstead
According to Jim Goodrich, writer of 'Skateboarding History', skateboarding began in 1947 when a man named Peter Parken , a local San Diego surfer, mounted roller skate trucks to the bottom of a wooden plank. His idea spread quickly and soon it was very popular. Fifteen years later in 1962, the first manufactured skateboards were introduced. Throughout the years the skateboard has been remade, reshaped and upgraded several times. Now skateboarding is a fun, popular hobby that many teens across America enjoy doing every day. There are two main types of skating- street and vert . Street skateboarding is basic flatland, rail, and ledge tricks. Vert skateboarding consists of riding in half pipes, bowls, etc. The most common type in Longmont and at Skyline is street skateboarding. Here at Skyline High School there are several students whose passion is skateboarding. Those students include sophomores Eric Patterson, Connor Dwyer and Alex Garcia. The three of these young skaters have each been skateboarding for over three years, and they have stuck to the sport since they started. When asked what their favorite thing about skateboarding was, Eric answered "Progressing." This means getting better each day, trying new tricks over and over again until you land them. Practice makes perfect. It's good to extend the amount of tricks by attempting new ones every time you skateboard. Connor replied, "I love that you can do whatever you want in skating, there are no rules or guidelines." Unlike official sports such as baseball, basketball, football, soccer, etc., skateboarding has no referees, umpires, coaches or opponents. Yet, it does have teammates, which are friends who like to skateboard together and encourage each other to get better and 'progress'. Alex said, "I love the feeling of landing a trick perfectly." When you land a trick, especially a new one, it is a good feeling because it is a reminder that you are improving and it encourages you to continue attempting that trick and other tricks like it. For certain people, there are different levels of seriousness in skateboarding. There are thousands of skateboarders in America, and out of those thousands, there are less than a hundred of them who became sponsored professionals. Most people skateboard for fun just to relax and be free, and others are all about it and spend hours skateboarding every day. The reward of being fully focused on skating and improving every single time is possibly making it to the pro league some day, but the chances are very slim. The more you skateboard, the better you get, and the better you get, the more fun you have skateboarding. Once you start, it is difficult to quit for most people, especially if you take the time to practice and improve. This extreme sport can be for anyone, it doesn't matter if you are five years old or thirty years old, skateboarding can be fun for anyone. |