Remember when Wisconsin boy Zach Kral destroyed that pasty faced Dutch kid’s old world record? Well, some other kid beat him again, and I kind of lost interest in the whole thing. That is, until Zach broke it again last week (on his 14th birthday) at the 4 Seasons Skatepark in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I love the midwest (as long as I’m not there in the winter) and this was as good an excuse as any to re-use a good graphic. The new record, according to the folks at Guiness is 1546 consecutive kickflips. Under their rules, no body part can touch the ground at all. Dang, I should have lumped this together with the other Guiness record post. Everyone seems to be slow in updating, even his father!

In Brazil, Danny Way broke his back on the Megaramp. He will recover, of course, because all Megaramp competitors are actually time traveling cyborgs built by Skynet. Watch the video after the jump. It’s not in English, but really, it’s more entertaining this way. Speaking of entertainment. Rob Thomson now holds the world record for Longest Journey by Skateboard, clocking in at 12,159km, or about 7,500 miles. It’s confusing though, because the “journey” took place in different non-adjacent locales and had periods of weeks in between legs. Sounds more like a record for the biggest lapse of judgement by Guinness officials. Maybe they cut him some slack due to the unsual circumstances reported by One India:

The strangest food he tried was horse-penis salami in Kyrgyzstan, which he said tasted “like the smell of a sweaty, old, dirty horse.

Uh yeah. Go figure. You can read all about it in his forthcoming book about the experience.

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“I think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward.  It is not so desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right.” -Henry David Thoreau, Civil Disobedience, 1849

On August 29th, Derek Anderson (Mark Conahan’s age) committed a breach of peace when he scaled a 300-foot crane located in the beer garden of the Doghouse Public House.  This act of civil disobedience was an aim to shed some light on a particular subject: the Dudhope Skatepark, pictured above courtesy of Google Maps user ihatetechnology,  in Westport, Dundee, UK.

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The LA Times reports that skaters and BMX riders alike are not too happy with ESPN’s Superpark course built by a BMX crew. The main complaints are “too small” and “tight transitions,” although you’d be hard pressed to tell by some of the photos. The Flying Tomato reminds us that this is the first year for the event, and next years will likely be better. Shaun White may be right, or he may just be more interested in making bad miniseries for HP computers. I seem to recall hearing that some of the early vert ramps in the X Games were kind of crappy too, but they eventually go that right. With more money on the line now, they’ll probably get right on that. Although the general public seems to only be interested in the Mega Ramp. [Photo: Los Angeles Times] - Thanks to Mac for the tip.

There are shin injuries, and then there are shin injuries. That shot in the top right is Danny Way hanging his shins out to dry on the coping of the quarterpipe part of the Megaramp after catching about 20 feet of air. Catch some incredulous highlights after the jump, including Jake Brown’s return to the event. Looking at that huge contraption… I can’t believe it’s actually used in a competition. An exhibition would be crazy enough. I hope those guys are getting paid. How the hell do you practice for this? It’s not like they have them set up everywhere. So yeah, those guys are skateboarding, and it’s amazing to watch, but one of these days someone is going to die or end up crippled. Best case scenario: They’ll be like Hank Hill’s shinless father Cotton Hill.

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OH yeah, I forgot to title this “Vert is dead, not dead, dead, not dead, dead….” I’m losing track of where we’re at here. Dave Swift over at the Skateboard Mag has some pictures of the new setup for the Super Park event at the X Games. If you recall, Super Park was supposed to be the replacement for the vertical event until the talent mutinied and said they would prefer to compete on the halfpipe. So now we have Vert and Super Park. Without getting into the politics, the Super Park course certainly looks more interesting than a vert ramp, and is more in step with what people who aren’t training for the X Games are riding, if not in the street. Now, to get into the politics, or at least social responsibility, carting that thing around to different venues seems like it would be a gargantuan task. We all know what happens to these ramps when they got through a season or two, they get donated. It’s one thing to fix up up a vert ramp or some pyramids that have seen some abuse, it’s relatively straight forward. What’s going to happen when they discard these massively complex bowl constructions? Sure, it’s not as wasteful as something as ludicrous as building a concrete skatepark for one time use. (Don’t get me started on that, it’s something I had planned for a rant already…) I’ve said it before, and I’m saying it again, ESPN needs to give back to the sport (besides paying the salaries of the top pros) by advocating for and financially facilitating concrete skateboard facilities across the nation, if not world, in ways similar to other high profile entities that make bank from skateboarding. Right. Don’t forget to check out the Super Park. It looks fun as hell. - Thanks to JF for the tip.

Motion Theory is a motion graphics studio that has done a lot of work you’ve probably seen, like the HP ad for Pharrell (hi res here) that also features skateboarding. They did a short ID piece for ESPN on Evolution, specifically the evolution of skateboarding. Apparently, it aired during the Superbowl, but which one? You can watch it and download it from the Motion Theory site. I wonder if they will notice a bandwith spike? As far as the animation goes, it’s fun to watch. As far as the evolution of skateboarding goes, it stops with what mainstream skaters consider the dodo birds of skateboarding, AKA the vert ramp riders - but I’m sure that’s what the client wanted. - Thanks (again) to Livmo for the tip. yeah, it’s going to be that kind of day.

Skaters love iPods and Pottery Barn. Now they can listen to their iPods by plugging them into a X Games shelf that looks like a skateboard and has built in speakers. The shelf can be used for magazines or copies of CD’s that they probably didn’t buy in the first place. Did you just get kicked off your skateboard team? Wrap yourself up in a nice X Games blanket and stare at your X Games wall mural from the comfort of your X Games bed sheets.

[Source - Gizmodo]

Just about this time last year everyone was freaking out over Jake Brown’s amazing escape from a potentially life ending or at the very least, life changing bail on the mega ramp at the X Games. Hard to believe he walked away from the slam heard round the world. Thankfully I’m not posting about the first annual memorial Jake Brown contest. I’m sure he’d be pissed that we’re bringing it up again, but after the jump there’s a handful of links that date back to the hysteria, and of course, you can watch the video again if you are feeling robust.

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Apparently the anguished cries of old men everywhere resonated in the halls of ESPN. EXPN.com reports:

ESPN has decided to continue its 13-year tradition of vert competitions at this year’s X Games. Over the past month ESPN has engaged in many conversations with the X Games BMX and Skateboard vert athletes in an attempt to transition the Vert discipline into one featuring a skatepark course design. While many athletes were initially receptive to the idea, the majority of them have indicated to ESPN that they would prefer to compete on a halfpipe.

So vert skating is back from the dead. Who could have predicted it? I think it’s funny that the athletes were the ones the brought it back. More telling is the fact that they plan to go forward with the Superpark concept in addition. I have a feeling that the vert riders who don’t decide to enter Superpark are going to lose ultimately. I see this as a temporary appeasement of the talent so they don’t have a mass boycott of riders. Sure, they’ll bring back vert for one or two more seasons while they quietly build up Superpark until ratings prove they don’t need vert anymore, because there will be a whole other gorup of riders who won’t complain about the format change. Superpark sounds more fun to watch in my opinion anyway. Ha! Check out the photo credit on the image in the source. (They are rotating them.)

- Thanks to CretinNik for the tip.