My Scariest Moment aboard a Skateboard**

It happened recently (2011) while bombing my own street, and even eclipses the events of Christmas Day 1995 (that's an earlier story). We live on a reasonably steep but short and nice little bombing hill. Good speed is achieved and then it rolls uphill. At the top of the hill there is a stop sign; a left turn and down the hill is a left hand bend (a dogleg). There is a single lane speed hump a little further on. The left handed dog leg means that the speed hump is not able to be sighted. I was on my Loaded Dervish at the top of the hill coming back from an early morning roll. A 3 tonne truck and a car preceded me and went through the stop sign and downhill. I gave them plenty of time to get out of the way, a good 20 - 30 seconds to have gone past the speed hump... and then I took off. My 'ohno' moment happened as I came around the dogleg at reasonable speed and Leaping Shitburgers 'JEEZUS' the truck and car were stopped waiting for a garbage truck to go through the single speed hump. My footbraking stinks; Pendy is non existent and my reactions were clearly not good enough. All I had available was to pick a line between everything. I hit 2 sets of catseyes, but stayed aboard. I grazed the truck mirror with my shoulder. The only thing I could do was to stay committed to the line I had available and went between all cars and trucks without any injury and a poofteenth of an inch to spare....following that episode I could almost swear that the colour of adrenalin is brown. There were two of the locals out for a walk who witnessed the whole thing and said that was so cool....Cool my arse....I near shit myself. Now, of course, I walk with my shoulders back when I pass these two punters but secretly I think they know it was more good luck than good management that I did not end up as road pizza.

Injuries**

Let me take you back to Critmas Day 1995, the family is gathered at the outlaws place in Pennant Hills north of Sydney in NSW. Santa got me these very cool shorts, and the big guy in red got my 5 y.o nephew elbow pads, knee pads and helmet. They had a sketchy old skatey and I hadn't skateboarded for about 5 years or so. I had done a couple of previous incident free bombing runs down Hillcrest Road Pennant Hills pre Critmas and all was OK. As a responsible uncle I had taken my 3 y.o nephew on a couple of these quick runs down the hill - he fitted neatly between my legs so we could both fit on board. Safety gear, overrated and inherently unnecessary - I was old school. Where was I - yep, that's right Critmas Day and the Penno neighbourhood was alive with kiddies on their new bikes, scooters and other assorted wheeled toys. I managed to coax my nephew out for a run down Hillcrest Road, so named for good reason. He had all of the safety gear on from Santa, I had my new shorts and an old pair of high top runners. All of the family were out to watch and all of the neighbourhood families watching their own kidlets on their new wheels. Everyone was on the street to watch this 6'4" lunatic try to maim and disfigure his young nephew. We started off at the top of the hill together both standing Goofy, with him tucked in with me and off we went - the only way was down and bugger me if it didn't go seriously downhill bloody quickly from there. He got a bit spooked at about 35km/h and moved a bit too much which upset our equilibrium sufficiently that a minor speed wobble began to develop, Within a poofteenth of a second a mild speed wobble became a death wobble and in slow motion as it was happening at the time, it was unrecoverable. All I could think about was how this poor little kid was going to get damaged because he trusted his uncle to deliver him safely from the top of the hill to the bottom - clearly that was not going to happen. The aforementioned death wobble reached critical severity and it was time to either beat a hasty exit and jump or to be catapulted from this spawn of the devil. I grabbed my nephew, bundled him into me and jettisoned the evil piece of wheeled equipment. as it happens, right outside Pennant Hills Police Station. We'd had a good head of speed up and our rendezvous with the bitumen went better than I had expected. My nephew was upset, understandably crying but unharmed, in fact there was not even a scratch of any of Santa's safety gear. I was in a different position, however. The lovely walking shorts that had been so lovingly wrapped by a member of the family were barely able to be described as shorts - they were cactus - utterly destroyed. No broken bones, but my dignity was another story - it was shattered. The walk of shame had to be done. I had to walk back up the hill with all of the families out on the street who had witnessed my majestic fall from grace and fall from the demonically possessed skateboard. There were many who did the tsk, tsk which I took to mean that I had allowed them to point out demonstrably to their own children why they shouldn't play on the road. All that I was wearing on our ill fated trip down Hillcrest Road was my ex-shorts, so you can imagine the work required to be done by my body to mend all of the missing components now devoid of skin. Ankles, calf, knee, thigh, hip, forearm, elbow, shoulder and back were all missing substantial layers of skin. This was not the worst thing however, using a nail brush at the outdoor tap to get the pieces of gravel out of the open wounds was an experience I can only liken to combing your hair with a potato peeler. Pain is personal though. To give an idea of the recovery work required by my body, it was three weeks before I was allowed back into the marital bed. We still talk about Critmas Day 1995 and my nephew, now 23 still talks to me and surprisingly doesn't kick me when he sees me.

Fast forward to World Youth Day Sydney 2008...Friday 18th July, my daughter Brittany rings me at work to say that my wife is staying in Pt Macquarie for the weekend with my daughter Belle. Conversation goes something like this 'The Pope has his pilgrims everywhere and the streets of Sydney are closed to traffic; wanna go for a skate'. Affirmative was my call and with the blessing of the Police we weaved in and out of pilgims all night...on the way home at about 11pm, skateboarding over the Harbour Bridge heading north I missed seeing a checkerplate cover. Doing maybe 20km/h the 'possessed by demons' skateboard stops instantly at the said checkerplate cover - I continue in an undignified version of simulated flight. All good while in flight but the landing was atrocious. Buggered elbow, knee, lots of skin gone; DNA left on eastern walkway of the Harbour Bridge and have destroyed another pair of flairs. Daughter laughing hysterically - at which time I found that my dignity was lying beside my my DNA, on the walkway of the bridge. Thanks Pope.

The one thing we learn from history is that we never learn from history. 15 years to the day - yes, Critmas Day 2010. we were in Pennant Hills with the outlaws again - you'll detect a tradition. We went out bombing hills in another hilly area of Sydney called Cherrybrook. We had a good 2 km downhill section with smooth bitumen and lovely meandering bends. My eldest daughter, 18 and very cocky, wouldn't wear gloves, knee pads or helmet. Bombing hit number 1, all good - uneventful and good fun. Episode 2, she got down too low and got death wobbles. She was lucky and got away with both knees and a hand grazed. Suffice to say that her body got it's chance to carry out repairs but grazed knees on a girl don't look so flash. Check her knees in Heelside mag - she is a featured chick longboarder.

I have repeated this skin eradicating exercise at the Pumpstation in the Blue Mountains at MOTH 2011 and then again at the Hopkin School of Speed in February 2011. My DNA is now on the roadway and in the dirt at the pumpy - woohoo. One day I might learn....but somehow I doubt it. I always wear a helmet though.

I recently purchased Cooper' Kruize's leathers for my 14 y.o daughter, Belle, so that there is no chance for the tradition to continue. I also bought Luca's fullface for racing.....she'll be safe.

Why I skate and how I started**

It would probably appear to the groms that when I fart there would a plume of dust, due to my age but I got started in skateboarding in 1968 when I was about 7. My first board was a Warwick Bullet which was made in the UK. I asked for a skatey for Critmas because my neighbour had a board made from an old expandable roller skate which had been split in two and nailed to the deck; I wanted one. The old Bullet had black rubber wheels and odd rubber trucks, well they seem odd now but it did turn really well for those days. Following that was the Surfer Sam experience - plenty of board but really skinny trucks, black rubber wheels and no turn...tic tac'ing was the way we turned those big angry bad boys. With the advent of urethane wheels and the Ultimate Flex Machine movie our hero was a yank called Russ Howell. He was big on handstands and 360's and came out for the 1975 Coca Cola Skateboard contest at French's Forest. I was there and it was a fantastic event...the footage from Forever Young is from that era. This was also the Bahne era - but who had parents who could afford them. My dad knew a guy who knew a guy who was selling wheels and truck sets so my brother and I ended up with Apolloflex Stoker wheels on Chicago trucks...loose bearings were fun (not) and there were no decks that we could get our hands on so we made our own out of three ply and a bit of fibreglass matting and resin. Most of the time we spent riding through the streets of Forestville and the playground at the Forest High School. In the fullness of time I transferred my wheels to a 'spastic plastic'. It was a formed plastic deck with a little kick tail at the back. My neighbour, a fitter and turner, made me a stall pad from cast iron and it got bolted to the rear of the board...it was how we slowed down.If you were belting down a hill you just brought the front wheels up and dragged the back. I could always be guaranteed for a light show throwing sparks up. As we went from early teens to mid and late teens we had more cash from returning bottles to the milk bars for refund and from paper runs. We also had more of an idea about what was what. So it came to pass that I got my hands on a Saurus deck with the Edwards, the first of the wide trucks and transferred the Stoker wheels to that bad boy. My brother had a DHD (David Hill Designs) board and we would ride the sandstone flagging banked walls outside the school hall doing radical re-entries from the top. The skatey was our primary means of transport. I'd skate from home to Warringah Rd, Frenchs Forest and then hitch to Narraweena where my surfboard was kept at a mates place and then go to Dee Why point for waves. When I got my P's we were driving but the skatey was always in the car because there was never any guarantee of waves at Macaha, Longie or Little Narra, in which case we'd skate Long Reef headland or around Beacon Hill, Collaroy or Cromer. I mucked around with the bushings in the Saurus and eventually worked out that the urethane bushings in the front coupled with my uncle's old thongs cut to size in the back gave me amazing turning .....so now the old Saurus hangs in the HopShop, the power pivot is also too somewhere along with my 70's skateboarding book. You can still see the original thong rubber still in place along with the sealed bearings which have never been changed or cleaned from the 70's and still roll well. I live in Naremburn which is documented in Willoughby Council archives as being called "Dogtown" back in the 1890's....irrelevant but interesting. I bought a Dervish from the HopShop a couple of years ago and then a little later I picked up a Demonseed for racing downhill.


I am actually indebted to a young 19 year old upstart named Jackson Shapeira who told me that I should get a helmet. I told him I was old school and it was unnecessary.I survived the 70's with no helmet no shoes....he simply outlined that there was no excuse for preventable brain injury, so I picked up a Triple 8. A couple of months later I tried to slide on a narrow section of footpath; slide I did not - turn sharply I did...forehead first into a handrail. Dazed yes - hurt NO. Thank you young Mr Shapeira.


I have 2 daughters who skateboard as well and we did our first ever organised downhill event at MOTH 2011. I was never going to trouble Benbro, Leeso, Jacko and the gang but had some fun...my girls got podiums (2nd and 3rd) so we were very pleased with the outing. Brit has a Loaded Vanguard and is currently in Europe on a Rayne Hustler. Belle rides a Norfin Manta, Norfin Pintail, Norfin Manta Foam Core with PanelVan paintjob and a Fibretec Flying Pan.


Why do we skateboard? Because we hate jogging.


We like the way the longboard community rolls - take the Matti Rae incident for example. If there is a man down then the community rallies. Couple this with the immensely dedicated souls that are the backbone of ASRA and why would you not live your life by it....when guys like Gabe, Cam and Jacko along with the rest of the gang are putting on Grom days, Schools of Speed and Slide Schools in Sydney and Merrick doing the same in Queensland then this community is tight. At Mt Annan School of Speed recently, Luca Coleman asked what it felt like to be skateboarding, he was respectful not to finish the question with 'at your age' and I thought for a moment and replied that when I jump on a skateboard the years fall away and I am back in my teens...and so it is...


I have the power to be happy or unhappy. I choose which. Yesterday is gone, tomorrow's not here. I have today, and I'm going skateboarding because that's what I like to do.


I would like to see a Masters category in the ASRA events..something for the Over 50's. Womens, Groms, Open and Masters. Seriously though, there should be more dads skateboarding with their kids because nothing pulls the family together than doing things together. I'd also like to skate with punters my age as well as skating with young people.


I skateboard because I am proud to be a part of such a great pursuit; I am pleased that I am still able to do it; and while I am my age I do not have to act my age....res firma mitescere nescit (L).


Something else that is really cool is that when I'm carrying or riding my skateboard and another guy is doing the same there is a nod or an eyebrow lift...a small, barely noticeable but mutual sign of respect. Any dude on a skateboard is my brother from another mother. Respect.