Saturday Skateboards passed on these photos to us. There are two guys in the army in Iraq who managed to convince the Commander and First Seargant of Camp Victory to allow them to build what look like a pretty decent miniramp. It’s a lot better than what the other guys are skating in Iraq. Alex and Keane are calling it “Operation Dust Pipe.” Notice the giant concrete barricade surrounding it? I suppose that’s to keep the snipers from pinching them during big airs… The surface looks like it’s been painted white like a giant reflecting oven, which is probably why they are skating at night. Check out the gun leaning up against the side of the ramp. That’s got to be against some regulation! Enlarge the photos after the jump. Thanks again to Saturday Skateboards for sharing. You can see a little of Andrew Cannon skating Saturday’s indoor park in the cross country trip video at the bottom of this page.

It looks like Tuscon’s new lighted skatepark is almost ready to open. The top shot is from Danimal’s friend Erik and the bottom two are from TusconSkaters.org. It’s funny how you can get an idea of who builds these things just by looking at them. This park has Site Design written all over it. The shot that gave it away for me was this one. Except that conflicts with a story and video in AZStarnet.com. Both Site design and California Skateparks list it in their portfolio. California must be the build contractor. Strange design choice, that keyhole pool. You don’t see too many of those being built now, and for good reason I think. Still, the channel looks fun. Notice that it’s not just a straight roll in for some reason. It’s a $1 million, 12,000 square foot project.

Peter DiAntoni has a show opening tomorrow in Milwaukee (I assume) titled Salad Days: Turf 30th Anniversary. It’s all photos of Milwaukee’s Turf skatepark that also has an earlier run as Surf & Turf, before taking a brief rest while serving as a strip club. I guess they build wooden platforms covering the bowls. Sadly, it’s been permanently destroyed now. Pete D. was the proprietor of Clueless Zine, of which I have a couple issues, but haven’t yet added to the 80’s zine archives. Dang, I need to get on that. If you skated in the midwest in the 80’s you went to the Turf at least once. A lot of people travelled there from other parts of the country. It also appeared in some Santa Cruz and Gullwing videos, possibly others as well. For some it was a travel destination, for others it was more like a home. Mr. DiAntoni will be screening Turf shirts on site at the opening, and if you have your old park ID you can get one for 1/2 price. I wonder if that works via mail order? – Thanks to Matt Grasser for the tip.

April 10th 7-10pm
Vetter Denk Building 161 s. 1st (corner of 1st & Pittsburgh) Milwaukee, WI

[Source: WiSkate]

Chad Jackson had skateboard company in the late 80’s and early 90’s called Small Beating. Actually, before that he ran a company called Swindle Skateboards. Chad was an am for Blockhead, Santa Cruz and Zorlac before becoming an early employee/friend of Foundation. Does that logo look familiar? He later had some bad blood with Swank (See Big Brother, September 1998) and he went out on his own again. We all know how good the 90’s were to vert skaters, so you can guess how that turned out. Time heals all wounds, or at least leaves an ugly scar. Chad has resurrected Small Beating Skateboards with some new product and a web site filled with Small Beating nostalgia, and nostalgia for an age yet to come. The blazing Michael Goetz photo at the top right is Chad atomizing the hand poured coping on the crazy Small Beating indoor ramp. You can see more of those shots over at The Skateboard Archives.

– Thanks to Sea Cliff Vert Ramp for the tip.

Here’s my video wrap up of our mini tour of southern Oregon skateparks that I made with Rich and MC on the occasion of Matt Kline’s BBQ session fundraiser for his bowl in Grants Pass Oregon. With apologies to Steve Grover, because I wouldn’t have brought my video camera if he hadn’t called me up and told me to shoot some “Spring Break” footage. When I lost the photos from this trip I was only able to avoid completely losing my mental health by the calming realization that I at least had some fun video footage. My apologies to the park locals who cooperated for the still photos. Chances are Rich might have some of you if you were in Winston, Matt’s Bowl, Myrtle Creek or Harrisburg. Yes, I am accepting donations towards a steadicam…

We’ve posted about this ABC footage before, but the short clip has since been pulled from YouTube. This instance from Google Video is almost a half hour long, and still doesn’t include the other footage. The actual footage is kind of hard to sit through, but the real gem is the audio track. When you get bored watching it, just leave it running in the background so you can listen to the commentary. It’s interesting to note that most of the “champions” are 12-14 years old. There really isn’t any way to tell from the Google page who uploaded this footage, although there are a lot of Burning Flag Press clips on there from the same user, which would lead me to believe it was either Friedman, or a big fan.

– Thanks to K.C. for the tip.

This week’s Shot of the Week comes from POX at Levil Uniform magazine. It’s Ryan Gagner in Portland, Or. Look for Levil Uniform’s latest issue, #11 AKA the Horror Issue Sequel. 32 pages of skating, metal, and horror. Features with Chaz Pineda, Birdo from Consolidated and Miko from CryptiqueTV, the self styled heir apparent to Elvira. They’re also releasing compilation CD’s, and I’m going to go out on a limb here and assume that they have the USRDA of thrash metal. We don’t have a resident metal head at SnA, but that’s ok, Levil Uniform has you covered.

Check out the Shot of the Week.

I had four different angles I was going to approach this from, but I couldn’t decide:

1 – When some men reach a certain age, they start to think about all the things they wanted in their youth, things that they equated with success in one’s life. For some men, it may be owning a Cadillac, or sailboat, or a house in a particular neighborhood…

2 – I hopped my neighbors fence last night, and that poser was digging a hole for a bowl he is supposedly going to build. He’s such a kook that I decided to blow it out before its even close to being finished…

3 – I went over to Mark’s house to take a picture of his hole. While I was there, I decided to see what he was digging in his back yard…

4 – A lot of people talk about what they are going to do all the time. Some people decide get up off the couch and actually do it….

Congratulations to MC for taking the plunge for his own backyard DIY concrete bowl! Expect to see many comics about the availability of shovel operators being inversely proportional to the amount of potential skateboard operators. Click to enlarge.

We’re checking in again on the status of the revival of the Capitola Classic. The idea has gained some momentum, but with the tanking of the economy, organizers aren’t sure how well the event would be attended, or even of what type of event to hold. It looks like the city is tentatively on board though. The Capitola Classic was be one of the premier downhill events of the 70’s and late 80’s, probably second only to Signal Hill. (Ok, I have to cop to pure speculation here, having never attended either event…) The Capitola Classic also has the recognition of being one of the first “streetsyle” contests.

I have to guess the event would be well attended. Economy woes? Those downhill and slalom guys live in their own bubble anyway. I guess Maryhill is the Capitola Classic of today, but I think the downhill community would get behind the event at least once. And who knows, maybe even Thrasher would get behind it once more for Fausto’s sake. The image at top is from the October 1981 issue of Thrasher.

You can get Capitola Classic updates on Twitter. While we’re doing downhill, you can listen to/read this NPR story on downhill racing: Malibu To Outlaw Skateboarding Daredevilry [Source: The Skateboarder’s Journal]

– Thanks to Judi Oyama for the tip.

Nyuk, nyuk, nyuk… The latest skateboard gadget in the grand tradition of sky hooks, rubber bands and magnets is the Ollie Buster, an elaborate setup that allows you to hold the board to your feet with the aid of some rubber tubing, a handle and a gratuitous skateboard wheel thrown in for extra weight. Reminds me a little of those fake yo-yos that were made with an internal spring to expand and contract the string. You know, for the truly lazy. Geez, I guess this is the same concept as Guitar Hero or Rock Band, and I am guilty of enjoying the hell out of those. Did I ever tell you about the time I was the weak link in (almost) every band I was ever in? The best part about the Ollie Buster web site is on the Goin’ Big skateboard moves where the kid opens up his Ollie Buster in the parking lot and nonchalantly throws all his trash to the wind. Now that’s realism!

– Thanks to Robert for the tip.