U.K.'S BEST SKATE PARK

[Mini Mansell]

my parents showed me a video today i did not know existed.  
they have had some old cine 8 transfered onto vhs of me as a 11 yr old.
2 minutes of it is in COLNE.
a beautiful indoor concrete skatepark
it shows a snake run,  a quick clip of the bowl  and a small half pipe.   if i can get it onto a pc somehow i will post it

[Wurz]

 8)Yeah, Colne was cool, Steve Gratton and  Danzi were there every weekend, and  Shogo did a demo there! The local thugs were a bit heavy though, I remember a running battle with several manchester skaters ending up in the hospital (they had crowbars!!!) Arrow in Wolverhampton was ruling! In the "Drain" (halfpipe with bowled-out ends and 180° corner) you had to choose your line very carefully and grind between the beams because the lip went right up to the ceiling! The capsule was rad too with 4ft of vert and square wooden coping! I remember seeing Phil Ashley? riding up the 4ft of vert,over the square coping, a foot up the wall and back down over the coping again Gnarly!! It was on three floors in an old warehouse. the first time we went there we ran around counting how many ramps/bowls there were! Here`s the list for Histories sake:4 bowls(wood!) 1 capsule/the Drain/1 Fullpipe/3 h-pipes.   Skateopia in Wolverhampton was ahead of its time with a bowl and H-pipe with the right amount of flat.  

[Slough_Skates]

Windsor Whiplash.......was it really called that?  I just remember calling it Billy Smarts.......but then is was a long time ago and my memory is fading with age.........

re the billy smarts owned skatepark, it was actually called 'Skatewave'. The place was mental and every new bit that was added had to have more vert than was previously there, those half pipes were sick and i remember spending about two hours standing on top of one psyching myself to drop in(i bottled it).The skatewave team ruled as well with robbie hunter,mark slough,jem moody,putt henry and glen&gary jefferies ripping it up regularly.When skatewave closed,derek(the manager)took over rolling thunder and we used to have skate comps between us and rom(robbie & marks local park), they were great days.        Dicky

[Mini Mansell]

yesterday i finally got to skate rampworx in liverpool.

wow the bowl took me back in time
8.5 foot trannies.  8 foot high.  8 foot of flat bottom.

its so tight.  it remined me of almost everything i skated 20 years ago.

[Edgie]

Nobody has mentioned Plymouth Zoo,, allegedly the largest concrete Skatepark in Europe in its day...

Mogul,,Fruit Bowl,,Freestyle area,,Beginners Bowl,,DZ Snake Run,,Hockey Stick,, and of course the famous Full Pipe....

Apparently the Hockey Stick and DZ Snake Run survive,, buried underground in Central Park Plymouth behind the Argyle ground for 22 years,, if make a pilgrimage you will be rewarded with a small piece of concrete protruding out of the grass.....

Come on Plymouth City Council.. DIG IT UP...Carefully!!!

[gavin]

no mention of southsea? lovely pics in the recent issue of sidewalk surfer.

[Edgie]

Check out www.middle-age-shred.com  

[edwin brockman]

A few posts back someone mentioned Lance Mountain at Mad Dog Bowl.  I was there that day and saw Lance skate.  If memory serves at one point he seemed to fly off the last "stepdown" and into the kinked wall,where he knocked himself out!!  
I remember telling people this tail and getting strange looks, and then years latter Lance mentioned  it in a Thrasher or Transworld interview........I knew I was'nt going mad.

Anyway back to the MDB..It was the first pool I ever rode and, as luck would have it, it was a ten minute walk from my house.  The first time I seriously tried to grind the pool I only hit the blue tile a couple of times..
then after a couple of tries I did it....but in my excitement I scared myself stupid and ended running down the wall across the bottom of the pool up the "stepdown" where I promptly stepped on the kicktail, where upon the board hit me square on the middle of my nose, which knocked me out and broke my nose!!!!
I was also there for the Alva visit oh! happy days!
The one thing i really remember about the session was watching Mad Mark baker start from the top of the halfpipe come down the side of it and go straight into the pool ...where he promptly did a SIX FOOT out frontside air...ON A SURF FLYER!!!!!!!!
He came out of the pool and gave the board to a small kid, who then dropped the thing because the wheels were hot.....

Memories are made of such things....
oops getting too old

[kuni]

check out brand new park in central scotland ,blantyre all concr   ete,hips ,bowls=shit load of lines                                                 Lanarkshire    Skates Dominates                                                      

[Phil King]

Yo Carl Hayway.  I think I used to skate with you but I never knew your surname properly.  I remember the "Boardwalk" in Grimsby - cool in its day.  Also the Horncastle Halfpipe indoors and Cherry Willingham mini park.  The Slam City guys used to travel miles to come there before they became entrepreneurs.  I live in Kettering now and the Wickstead park is gone.  For those with cloudier memories than mine, its no great loss.  The surface was pure grit, the big bowl was an unridable joke, but I guess the kidney was pretty good to be fair.  Best park for me would be the Knebworth park which was a mixture of patchy design and accidental brilliance.  The big flat bottomed bowl at the end of the pipe was magic and the cloverleaf was gorgeous.  All a bit gritty but OK with P9's or lime green kryps; even bones 5-4's.  That's been dozed now.

[long time stockwell loke]

only skated Knebworth once, but it'll stay with me for ever.  I was working on a shit building job for the summer in St Neots and not getting paid - don't ask!

Skating the local mini, this guy turned up in a little white van and skated, we hooked up and went to Knebworth - ace halfpipe to the bowl, loverly cloverleaf (i wish it was still there - oh those hips!).  He knew the secret way in up the track to avoid having to pay.

From here we went to stevenage.  Again, amazing for a northerner who'd only skated wood since Bolton and Colne sessions as a sprog.  I remember sharing a doob on top of the vert ramp before dropping in - that was the proviso of sharing the joint...

Then we went on to a raging session at Dennis' in Hitchen - his local place.  Everyone was tearing up this backyard ramp - including some model dude who I remember was shagging a Page 3 girl.  I remember Dickie was there doing stuff I'd never even heard of.  "possessed to skate, skate possessed" was the call of the day  

Such a perfect day to end a shit summer.  I'm fucked if I can remember the blokes name though.

[Brad Bradley]

Thanks for your memories of Wicksteed Phil - but I think a lot of the people that skated the park right through the 80's and into the 90's would disagree with you.  It was a great loss to all of us that spent our teenage years skating there.

[guest]

John Tiney told me lots of good things about it.  He shed a tear when the man 'dozed it.

[phil_king]

Hi Brad - God I hope you do disagree!  Skateparks are objects of love.  I loved Cherry Willingham but in a way it was bit of a joke park (except for being the smoothest concrete ever as it was molded glass reinforced concrete).  I only skated Wicky's a few times but it didn't meet my expectations of a cool park back then.  But now I would kill small children and their pets to have access to that kidney bowl again, so I would.  I also totally adore Meanwhile 2, but its hardly Uplands is it?  Its the memories and the mates and the tricks you learned and the warm pork pies and cokes we scoffed.  I still think it was rubbish, but gawd, I'd love to have it back.  Crumble on!

[Ben Bowling]

Here's my two pence worth;

Hey! I think we met last Sunday at PS2 talking 'oldskaters' on the vert. You mentioned the web address.

I'm pretty certain the picture of you in the skatepark is the West Midlands Safari Park which had a wonderful pool where I spent much of my formative years. Sadly buldozed a few years ago to make way for a roller coaster. Thoze were the daze.

bb

Anyone remember where this was, I remember it was a Safari Park, perhaps Woburn, not sure, but after this pic was taken I spent the afternoon in the pool, which I remember being like a bigger version of the one at Rom?:


I'm sure I'll remember more, but my old brain can't think of any more at the minute
:-/