This is a big weekend for Marginal Way benefits. May 10th is the date of the Seattle premiere of Dave Hupp’s excellent video “Why Wouldn’t You?” There’s additional footage since the Portland Premiere, and the video and sound have received the final master. DVD’s and T-shirts will be available as well. There is a $3 entry fee, all of which will go to the Marginal Way project. May 10th at 8pm – Capitol Hill Arts Center. 1621 12th Ave, Seattle Sunday May 11 the much-anticipated Thrasher Skate Rock Tour, final stop Marginal Way! Thrashers legendary Skate Rock collection is celebrating their 13th release with live music from bands such as Grindline the Band, Bad Shit, Shed, Pissboner, Kilgore, and many more local bands including Board Youth that will be opening up the show for the Seattle stop. Marginal Way advocates will be grilling up BBQ, selling Tee’s and making money to keep building Marginal! 2pm to dusk at the Marginal Way Skatepark. (Saturday is the Portland stop of the Skate Rock tour.) What the heck do they need the money for? Check out these Stakbot pics of some recent concrete pours (Scroll down to bottom)

Yesterday in Portland, Cal Skates sponsored a skate jam as part of the 6th Avenue Street Fair that seemed to be taking place in front of Cal’s and that’s about it. I’m always complaining about a lack of artsy fartsy ramps in the states, but we had some here for sure. The big quarter pipe was covered in tiles on the top third, tiles that continued to break and fly off through the course of the session. It looked like it was giving everyone a bit of trouble, but at the same time they seemed to enjoy the added challenge. Another cool feature were two launch ramps that had been done up rather nicely to make it look like they were split from a cross section of a giant Northwestern tree. Kudos to whoever it was who realized that concept. Well done.

The 30th anniversary Independent Trucks tour is coming to a skatepark, DVD, and Thrasher magazine near you. A great big list of the pros on the tour, but they are doing it in shifts, so it’s anyone’s guess who will be at what stops. Not true. The Indy tour site has the tentative roster for each stop. Let’s see… Lincoln City, Oregon on Sunday, June 29 from 2:00-5:00 pm, featuring Darren Navarrette, Jeff Grosso, Chet Childress, Slash, Peter Hewitt, Emmanuel Guzman, Steve Alba, Danny Way, Alex Horn, Sam Hitz, Tony Trujillo, Alex Olson, Grant Taylor, Tosh Townend, Spanky, Randy Colvin, Tommy Guerrero, John Cardiel, and Max Schaaf. How are those guys going to fit in one truck? Here’s a curious one, co-sponsored by RedBullSkateboarding.com.

Last Saturday there were two events coincidentally planned for the same day at Portland’s Pier Park. One was a neighborhood cleanup championed by Mark Conahan and the other was some sort of Pier Park locals appreciation event organized by Chris Nukala. There was a short speech and some short spot-driven contests with plenty of giveaways. I arrived late to the cleanup and and had to leave early and in a hurry, due to, well, you know. I didn’t get any decent shots, but Michael from The Skateboard Archives was there snapping away, so I’ll link if he posts anything. Also, GVK cameras were on the scene for a little while. Otherwise, this is what you get. UPDATE: More cleanup coverage on EPM. UPDATE: More coverage on The Skateboad Archives.

Remember the pasty faced Dutch kid with the vaguely effeminate first name that set a new consecutive kickflip record? Yeah, me either. There’s a new kickflip champion in town. He’s 13 year old Zach Kral, and he hails from Waterford, Wisconsin. Like James Brown, he hit it and quit it at 1200. On Saturday, 4-5-08, Zach Kral, 13 of Waterford, Wi, did 1200 consecutive kickflips to win the Fuze Kickflip Challenge at 4Seasons Skatepark in Milwaukee, WI. It took 1 hr and 42 minutes to complete. He said he started to get tired at around 1160, so he decided to stop when he got to 1200. He started from the first one on his first try attempt and went straight through to 1200, while staying in constant motion. Mike Gonzalez of Kragon Action Sports sent in the tip, I think because Zach must be on his team. There’s a Fuze Kickflip Challenge event page and a Flickr stream if you are interested. Somewhere in Holland, Laurens Groenveld is crying over his puny 566 consecutive kickflips. I hope I don’t get targeted by hackers in Amsterdam again. Did I mention I like Heineken?

Jay Meer bought me a beer last night at the premier of Why wouldn’t you?, the new video from Dave Hupp. I don’t know if Meer was fully cognizant of the fact that he bought me a beer or not, but thanks all the same. Now go visit Jay’s web site so he gets his money’s worth. How was the video? In a word, great! Full review coming as soon as the DVD’s are produced, which is supposed to be before the end of April. Look for it. Jay said he’s hosting a premier in Seattle at on an as yet nailed down date. If anyone else is looking for kickbacks, I like brown ales. [Photos: DLH Productions.]

More on one of those other communities I heard rumors of. This video is an event called the PDX Death Race 2008. PDX is the ID for Portland’s airport, for those of you outside the area. No, the race wasn’t a the airport, that would be kind of flat, you know? This was a downhill race that involved some slalom cones that seem pretty far apart, so technically that would be Giant, Giant slalom I guess. Just because they are spaced far apart doesn’t mean it was an easy course by any means. You can see in the footage that the alternating cones were extremely close to the shoulder of asphalt. Looks very burly. After the race footage there is some bonus Coleman slide session footage.

Chris from Old School Skateboarding went on a group mission organized by Josh Burt for what was originally supposed to be the Portland Roll-in Challenge, but ended up being “let’s find the jankiest and roughest shit in Portland and try and skate it or roll over the top of it.” Looked like it was a good time. I would have liked to cover it if I had known about it. It’s almost as if there is some sort of diverse skateboard community in Portland with other web sites besides this one. I know, it sounds crazy, but I might have to investigate. Check it out on Old School Skateboarding, or watch the video after the jump. [Source: Sleestak]

Who is up for being Skate and Annoy’s on the scene correspondent for this Skatepark of Baltimore fundraiser? We’re interested the skateable art part especially. There are no details on this March 15th event on the official SOB site, which looks like it hasn’t been updated since October of last year. Fortunately, Seth Levy sent us an email. What is it the third anniversary of? “Three years of not having anything built yet but maybe soon hopefully.” Stick with it! And we’re serious about wanting to get some coverage of the event if anyone is up for it.

Well, not really. Lance Robson sent in a link to more coverage of the 2008 Florida Bowl Riders Cup at Cocoa Beach via his photo set on Flickr. Top down that’s Benji Galloway (Yeah Benji coverage!) Donovan Rice, and Jesse Martinez. And yes, Hooters was an official sponsor, something I learned on Tim Ebaugh’s slide show. How about some Hooters girl-on-girl-on-longboard action? Wait a minute, two girls riding the same, uh, err… longboard. But doesn’t that make them kooks? I’m conflicted. To recap: A slideshow from Photographer Tim Ebaugh. Some photos from Santa Ana Dave: The Pros – The Masters Rickloose Florida Bowl Riders cup set on Flickr