Stop the presses! The days of slipping, banana peel-style off the top of your deck are over. Ferrari has made an important advance in friction technology. Apparently, the grip tape on this Ferrari branded skateboard is also coated with some sort of magical anti-slip material, which would make it even gripier than regular old grip tape. I hope they didn’t use spray-tack on griptape, otherwise my patent dreams are over.

The Ferrari skateboard features a seven-layer Canadian maple board and stretches 79 cm by 20 cm. The Grip Tape on the upper surface (with Ferrari logo) is coated in an anti-slip material to improve grip. A stunning Ferrari red finish, the Italian tricolour and the Prancing Horse logo adorn the underside. The skateboard also has black 54 x 36 mm polyurethane wheels custom moulded with a red stripe. The Ferrari skateboard comes in a stylish red nylon carry bag too.

Ferrari has been slapping their logo and PMS color matched red paint on host of mediocre non-automotive devices such as laptop computers for several years now. Further diluting the brand name with a mediocre skateboard must have seemed like a good idea to them as well. Who makes those trucks and how hard are those wheels? Who cares, because it comes with a stylish red nylon carry bag! Count me in. I’m sure this $169 bargain will be available from the Ferrari Store for a long, long time, but just in case it isn’t, there are pictures after the jump. Seriously, who is this aimed at? I guess this would be the skateboard James Spader would have ridden in Pretty in Pink.

[Source: Be Sportier]

Yes folks, it’s the same people that bring you modern day cannibals, a woman who had 69 babies and the 200 pound tumor. The 9th wonder of the world appears to be something known as the “Urban Jib Park.” Witness the wonder and the horror of The Ripley’s Urban Rail Park – an urban rider’s dream, according to the folks at Polson Pier in Toronto, where it is located. Although open since December 21st, pictures of the actual park appear to be as rare as ostrich-footed Africans. Apparently, they built some rails at the bottom of a pile of snow for the snowboarders and put up a big heated tent with some ramps for the skaters. Things must be bleak in Toronto, because you can even buy a season pass for all this awesomeness:

20ft wide 4 foot mini-ramp
4 stair with hand rail
60 ft wide bank with grind box at the top
5 ft ¼ pipe
6 ft ¼ pipe
Fun box with rail

They will have unspecified rock concerts, pro demos and contests. I predict that this park sucks – BELIEVE IT OR NOT!!

[Source: PR-Inside]

I love it when science fiction type technology becomes real, and so do you. A cheeky brit (uses the F-word in interviews!) has invented a polymer foam that is flexible until the molecules are excited, and then it get harder faster than a 13 year old boy slow dancing. So far it’s already in use in some sports equipment like shin guards and goalie gloves for soccer. Quiksilver has reportedly made a beanie with the material, called 3do foam, although a web search of the site reveals nothing. (Update: Here’s a buy link, but 6500 Euro is $9,595. That can’t be right. ) Globe shoes has an exclusive action sports footwear license for the material, and is said to be using it for absorbing heal impact without sacrificing flexibility. It sounds like an amazing breakthrough for street skaters, and even bowl riders who have been known to get a bruised heal. Suddenly, knee and hip pads can be totally unobtrusive as well. The foam only works where it is up against a somewhat rigid surface, so it won’t protect you against getting a board to the nuts. Now if they can just get this technology into trucker hats and hoodies, maybe you’ll finally see fashionable helmets at skateparks. You can watch a video of a reporter whacking the inventor on the head with a shovel after the jump. – Thanks to Grumpy Joe for the tip.

The beginning of the feature to be known as “I was sick for a week and now I’m recycling all kinds of things seen first on Skatedaily.net” Here’s an interview of Tony Hawk perfomed by (because they are performers, right?) ECW female wrestling star Lalya. She was either uninterested or phoning the whole thing in. Most of here responses are “Wow, that sounds amazing” or “Wow, that’s awesome.” Other than that it’s mostly the routine questions about the video game, Tony Hawk Foundation, and his roller coaster ride. Also mildly amusing: Tony trying to explain how fans of the WWE would most likely also be interested in his video game,and the photograph of Lalya that makes her look like Rita Moreno on steroids. And the hair on Tony’s chest? That’s costume and makeup for an upcoming Proving Ground commercial designed to make him look like a pigeon. There are more shots of Rodney Mullen and Ryan Sheckler getting dressed up as flying rats on Tony Hawk’s Road Journal. What was the point of this post? Oh yeah, Layla gets Extreme with Tony Hawk.

[Source: Skate Daily]

OK, it’s a bit of a stretch, but from India comes the movie Kranti that features an action scene with very Back-to-the-Future-esque stunt skateboarding. You can watch a clip of a policeman using a skateboard to capture a criminal on the run over at Nanarland. Best pause it and let it all download before playing.

[Source: Boyington on Flickr]

Time was when a jock wouldn’t be caught dead on a skateboard. What are you, 10 years old? Skateboards are kid’s toys, you fag! Nowadays it’s a different story. Star athletes in high schools and colleges are getting injured on skateboards and it’s making the papers. By the way, it’s impossible to find a decent still photo from the Breakfast Club on the web anywhere. I had to resort to spending way too much time on picking a good screen capture from a DVD. The things I do for skateboarding… Molly Ringwald peaked in this movie.

Eww.. gross. Get your mind out of the gutter. Joining Blake Nelson’s Paranoid Park is Nick Hornby’s Slam. You might recognize Nick Hornby as the writer whose books get made into good movies like High Fidelity. Slam’s protagonist is skateboarding obsessed and regularly holds imaginary conversations with Tony Hawk who answers in not always relevant quotations from his autobiography. Sounds like an amusing premise actually, if it weren’t written for young adults. Actually, if you can enjoy Harry Potter, why not Slam?. It’s interesting to note (OK, maybe not) that Tony Hawk is so pervasive that his status as a cultural icon can now be a bit supporting character in books much like Elvis was in the movie True Romance. Hornby’s had a few of his books made into successful movies, so maybe we’ll see a Tony Hawk cameo that’s a little better than what he did in Thrashin. While it’s unclear whether or not royalties were paid to the old 80’s wrist guard company of the same name (Haw!), it is clear that skateboarding is a hot topic for those trying to sell to the young adult market. Speaking of being in the market for young adults (what is this Perez Hilton?) the Gus Van Sant adapted Paranoid Park for a movie before it was even properly published. We heard rumors that Paranoid Park the movie was doing well overseas, but we haven’t heard squat about it in the states, or even in Portland where the damned thing was filmed. Hornby’s Slam comes out on October 16th, and for some reason the cover on the US version is skateboard-free while the UK version is what is shown above. There’s a spoiler heavy review of Slam at The Guardian.

No, this isn’t the start of a recurring feature, just a reference to the fact that we had a similar post last friday. Adult film stars are kind of like pro wrestlers sometimes, they need to have a gimmick to distinguish themselves from the rest of the competitors. Keeani Lei lists skateboarding and surfing among her other uhm, talents. I first got, err, turned on to her via a Sleestak post, but they got it from the NSFW Slap Magazine forums. Come to think of it, Slap sounds like some sort of a fetish magazine. In any case, Keeani does indeed skate and appears to enjoy it. She’s into flyouts, women, Jason Jesse re-issues and you know… other things. I like the shot where she’s pretending to drink OJ’s out of a juice pitcher, a visual pun that would be lost on anyone who didn’t skate. Reminds me of some of the 80’s skateboard advertising. She’s really going for the niche market. There’s safe for work video after the jump.

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I can’t wait for the informercial. It turns out they can even help you get a college scholarship. And to think I dropped out of college because of skateboarding.

Exotic Magazine can be found in strip clubs in the Portland area (or so I ‘ve been told, if my wife asks.) It’s pretty much an excuse to advertise strip clubs, lingerie and fetish wear, and about two pages of articles. They have a cover girl who is featured in the centerfold calendar of all the adult events for the month. The September 2007 issue appears to have been shot at a very famous skate spot in Portland. I for one, want to protest the way in which the skater in the photograph is objectified and robbed of his identity by not showing his head, as if he is just a piece of meat. It really burns me up inside.

[Source: Sleestak]