I had a go on a surf skate once. It was weird and wobbly. You could ride straight up the side of a bowl and ride back down again without lifting your front wheels. Why you’d want to do that is a whole other question.
It dramatically cuts down the number of options open to you - no kickturns, no grinds, no fakies, no dropping in but lots of wigggling instead.
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You just knew before you clicked on that, it was gonna have some reggae style music.
I’ve been listening to the ari shaffir podcast for a while now he’s just dropped an episode with Tom Schaar about staying in Paris and the Olympic village.
On the subject of surfing… never surfed personally but cannot recommend this book highly enough. Irrespective of whether you’re interested in surfing or not it’s a brilliant read.
Edit: I might’ve accidentally embellished the cover with some fat fingered squiggles near matey there
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I don’t want to come across all Alva/Gesmer, and I’ve never stepped on a surfskate and maybe never will, but I can totally get why this is something you’d want to do. Carving is a totally different sensation to kickturning. Some trannys/banks are hard to carve and easy to kickturn, and vice-versa, and it feels different to do it either way. And we’re all here for how it feels, right?
My bro has a mate in Paris i’ve always thought was a bit of a knob, turns out he’s into surf skating. Suspicion confirmed
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Sorry Sleipnir, I don’t mean to target you, I’m just picking up on things you’ve said.
But this^^ is one of the appeals of riding a polarizer, it means you can’t do lots of things that you’re used to doing, you’re limited to carving and it’s not that easy to do it. It makes skating hard, scary and fun again.
Yeah you can also carve around on a ‘normal’ board, but it’s different, that’s all. It’s more akin to that pic of Jay Adams that someone posted above, or at least it feels that way.
That’s maybe the feeling that the surfskate dudes are chasing, I dunno
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I’ve read Barbarian Days a couple of times and can confirm it’s a really good read. It reminded me a little of ‘The Answer is Never’ by Jocko Weyland.
This is good too. Despite my reservations that it was going to be some sort of extreme sports, chest beating, macho bullshit because of my (unfounded) preconceptions of Garrett McNamara - he of the Nazare 100ft wave fame - The cover tagline of ‘wild man, wild waves, wild wisdom’, probably didn’t help. It turned out to be quite the opposite. His upbringing was pretty mental with an acid soaked hippy mom, no money and a lot of travelling around. His being a haole in Hawaii as a kid has similarities with both Jocko Weyland’s and William Finnegan’s experiences.
I’ve just finished this and can recommend it too. One guy’s surfing year in Santa Cruz - really enjoyable.
He’s written a similar book about climbing.
If you’re looking for a surf book to avoid I would recommend giving this bag of shite a wide berth. Terrible in every respect.
Just to reiterate what @cleam.clackers said, whether you surf or not, Barbarian Days, and both of the books I’ve recommended are worth reading.
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