Bad News Dept: Montreal's Top Challenge is Cancelled. The '08 edition of this multidisciplinary event has been cancelled, according to event organizers, who reported,"A new comitee to protect the Parc du Mont-Royal has convinced the city to stop allowing permits for events that last more than 24 hours..."
This reduces the major events for '08, leaving only Munnsville for large, East Coast races.
Jeff Tatum is "the original longboarder", but isn't one of those dudes that sit on their laurels and talk about glory days instead of skating. JT rips it daily, and has recently been on the road, working with skatepark owners and designers. Recently, his travels took him to a town outside Omaha, Nebraska and when he got back he was so stoked about the skatepark scene there that he sent another of his reviews in:
Vinny's Skatepark
Papillion, Nebraska
A buddy of mine and Pool King team photog, Mark Fountain, lives in Nebraska. Mark told me about a skatepark being built in Nebraska and that the owner, Vince Serratore, needed someone to do his whole art campaign for the park stickers, tshirts, banners, logos etc. So, Mark hooked me up with Vinny and I got the gig. I flew out to Omaha, then drove about 20 minutes over to a town called Papillion, where Vinny’s Skatepark occupies 7,000 square feet in what looks like it used to be a small warehouse. Vinny turned out to be a real cool guy and once he learned of my skate history he asked me if I would sign autographs and do a skate demo with the Pool King Nebraska dudes. I was impressed with the facility and thought you skaters on Silverfish might enjoy another skatepark review, so here it is!
Jeff Tatum continues on his quest to hit every skatepark he can, over and over, and to report back how he rates them. This time, he takes us to a suburb in Los Angeles, just south of Santa Monica...
Culver City: the Mickey Mouse Pool
The Culver City skate park is a mix of the best and worst use of cement I’ve ever seen together in one place. As skateparks go, it’s relatively small, consisting of a street/flow area and also a Mickey Mouse head-shaped pool with pool coping and the shallow end being the ears.
Michael Early, frontside at Culver.
The “mickey mouse pool” is a pretty serious bowl.It’s got a deep end at about 10 foot deep and the two shallow end pieces are about 5-½ foot in the one and 6 foot in the other. The deep end has a fairly quick tranny to almost vert and the shallow ends have a quicker tranny with about 5 or 6 inches of vert. The finish on the cement is good and smooth but grippie with pretty beefy backyard style coping. The whole bowl is very backyardish for a park. There are a few lumps in it but otherwise it’s built well.
In recent months, we've brought you scene reports from around the globe. Now, check out the stoke coming from a group of longboarders in the Central American nation of Panama:
Longboarding in Panama is Alive!
Longboarding in Panama, Central America, still a young sport OR lifestyle as some might say, the first longboarders started appearing on the country hills maybe some 10 years ago, carving, down every hill they could find on their path. In the last couple of years there has being a global boom regarding longboarding, and Panama has also taken part on this popularity, skateshops are know carrying products specifically for longboarding, downhill OR sliding as much as regular skateboarding equipment.
Here's an update for us on the skate scene in Northern Virginia, turf for the NoVa Bombers and former home of both Silverfishes founder and Malakai Kingston. The skating is great, the skaters are stoked and Justin Metcalf wrote in to tell us how things are going...
SCENE REPORT: NORTHERN VIRGINIA
Northern Virginia is home to one of the fastest growing residential areas in the US, the power leaders of Washington DC, and some of the worst traffic in the nation.With the stress and hostility these features bring, one would not expect to find a thriving and rapidly growing skate scene here as well.However, Northern Virginia is home to one of the strongest skate crews on the East Coast.
I was first introduced to the NOVA longboarding scene last spring after following a friend to a session on a local hill.I was hooked almost immediately after seeing the guys fly around the corner at the bottom of the hill.After a few more sessions of following the other guys around, I bought my first board last summer.I haven’t looked back since.The skate scene in Northern Virginia is truly one of a kind with a group of happy and supportive guys (and girls) that manage to grow and have an awesome time despite hills that pale in comparison to much of the country and a local atmosphere that is largely unsupportive of skating.Northern Virginia is home to some of the most talented riders on the East Coast and one of the most lively skate scenes in the US.
[The Moab of Longboarding, Free Demo Boards, Stoked out riders and Free shuttle rides? We got to spend some wheel time with the owner of Ridin' High, and told the man; "we want to know more!" John was nice enough to not only share a bit of his story, but also the story of Ridin' High, The premiere Longboarding shop in Burlington Vermont]
I first arrived on the scene in 1995 after wandering the country for the previous seventeen years. My pilgrimage began in Ocean Beach, San Diego in 1977. Nomadic life carried me to Glenwood Springs Colorado then traipsing around the Baja of Mexico searching out hot springs before moving to three different parts of the Lone Star State. From there, lived on the Jersey shore, dairy farm in Massachusetts, High Peaks in the Adirondack mountains of New York, Hillsborough, New Hampshire until finally landing in Burlington, Vermont after a year on a farm in Orwell.
Scene Reports 
