skatenews

Enuff Demo

Thanks to the Enuff team for a great demo. Everyone in the team skated their butts off and left the park bruised and battered. To see a gallery of the demo, click here.

EA Skate

Thanks to Rich Holland for sending this edit through of the EA Skate Block Jam.
By the way, the game is amazing!

EA SKATE
San Vanelona is the virtual city you can ride in the game SKATE from EA. Inside this city lies a landscape inspired by real world skate spots. To celebrate the launch of SKATE, EA has recreated seven iconic skate spots from San Francisco and Barcelona and placed them in skate parks across the country. Each object has a trick challenge set against it and laid down by a UK pro, in both the game and real life. If you can nail the trick or one up it, you and a mate could be on your way to skate that city for real.
Entering is easy, just get a mate to film you doing the trick we’ve set (or something better) on any one of the blocks. Then upload that clip to the website below. The clips will be judged by Andy Horsly from Sidewalk Magazine and Niall Neeson from Kingpin Magazine. Loads more prizes including PS3’s & copies of the SKATE game are available too, so whatever your level of skating, you’re in with a shout. For further details on how to enter, go to:
skate.electronicarts.co.uk

Street Furniture
Installation of skatable furniture / objects in 7 skateparks across the UK inspired directly from the game and real world locations, then locations are:
The Factory, Dundee - www.factoryskatepark.com
Bay 66, London - www.baysixty6.com
Rampworx, Liverpool - www.rampworx.com
Revolution, Broadstairs - www.revolutionskatepark.co.uk
The Park, Gt Yarmouth - www.theparkwarehouse.co.uk
The House, Sheffield - www.thehouseskatepark.co.uk
The Works, Leeds - www.theworksskatepark.co.uk

Each piece of furniture is based on street objects found within the game SKATE which have been inspired by real world locations from either Barcelona or San Francisco. The furniture is made from a combination of stone & wood and has a plaque attached to it. The plaque explains the story of the inspiration for that piece, where it is from in real life and what the trick challenge is. Each piece comes with an associated trick challenge that has been set by by a uk pro skater from Death or Blueprint. Each pro skater has chosen a specific object within the game, which we have created for real. Then they have layed down the challenge both virtually and physically, the videos of these tricks are viewable online here:
skate.electronicarts.co.uk

The skater that is chosen by the judges doing the best trick on each object, will have the opportunity to go and experience skating that city for real with a mate; 5 of the objects will be related to Barcelona and 2 will be related to San Francisco. You can only submit one entry per block, however, if you want to improve your chances, you can travel to each skate park and enter each specific trick challenge. The winners will be announced and contacted in October, the judges are Andy Horsley from Sidewalk and Nial Neeson from Kingpin.

New Block has been installed

Some of the guys from EA Sports came down to install the new concrete ledge in the outside area.
"Boots" from Death Skateboards came along to film his trick on the block as part of the promotional campaign for the game "Skate".

Vans Summer Cookout: Saturday 23rd June 2007

Saturday 23rd June was the long awaited date for the Vans Uk Skateboard team to visit for their "Summer Cookout" demo but more importantly it was the opening of the new and improved outside Skatepark area here at Revolution. The demo took place between 6-10pm and there were a few hundred people keen to check out what these guys had to offer along with several local kids competing in a variety of best trick competitions including: stair, flat bank and pool coping jams.

The first port of call for the night was to open the new smooth stylish ramps and let all the skaters have a roll around to sight up all the different lines that were on offer whilst Dj Tickets took to the elevated stage to thump out some phat beats. Nic Powley (Vans Team Manager) hooked up with the tickets to organise the best trick comps to take place after the Vans crew dazzled the crowds with a demo. The Vans team included: Ben Nordberg, Kev “The Plasterer”, Gorgeous Dave, Aaron Sweeny and James Gardener (aka J. Gards). These guys really lit up the park with a crazy vert wall expression session and popping front/backside airs, blunt flips, slides and transfers out the mini ramp. The spectators got fired up, cheering and pumping these guys up to go bigger and better before the local kids got to have a go.

The kids kept screaming for product so that’s what they got starting off with the stairs and vert best trick comp, all the skaters threw themselves around flipping and spinning off the stairs for free pairs of shoes from Vans. Curly blonde dude cracked the best trick on the stairs with a kickflip and pop shuvit out, with young Bob Bennett clearing the stairs sweetly for a tee shirt or too. The vert wall and flatbank continued to get killed with James brown busting several flip tricks to receive a pair of trainers and many skaters hit up tricks for tee shirts. The vibe of the outside park was awsome and the Vans team comented on how good the session had been, enjoying all the elements of the night.

So the Revolution crew want to say huge thanks to Vans for opening the park and for providing skaters with free product. So let everyone else know to get to Revolution to try out the new summer area, don’t miss out!

Click here to see the pictures.

Easter Skate Camp 2007

On April the 9th 2007 at 11am Revolution saw the Return of Our Easter Skate Camp, bringing with it, over 30 keen young Skaters. This was the start of a whole week where the kids get to visit everyday and have instruction from some of Thanet's best Skaters.
This year we managed to get a few sponsors and a few days prior the event a shed load of goodies arrived. Rumors of the main prizes filtered around the skate park and amped the kids up even more. This year the level of skating had risen to a all time high, guys like Ben Greenstreet pulling huge Kickflips over big gaps, Bob "Killer" Bennett making 360 indys look easy and Dennis "7 feasts" Hester learning Blunts. As usual, the week included fancy dress and as always, the overall behavior of the kids involved was exeptional and I enjoyed every moment of it. Throughout the Camp, games and comps were held to determine the winners. This year, the weather was on our side so we could finish the camp off with a water fight.
Now it was time for the prizes and this year we had loads of gear to give away. Some main prizes were:
An Almost poster signed by Daewon and Haslam which went to Bob Bennett for an overall positive attitude. (Througout the Camp, he never stop pushing himself).
Pair of Es Shoes to Ben Greenstreet because over the course of the camp he managed to learn kickflips and then do them over every posible ramp in the park.
Best Fancy Dress was won by Dan McCusker who dressed as a Chef.
As always, we had the sticker toss where everyone went away with Badges,Stickers, Posters, and Patrick McDonald even managed to sniff out a pair of wheels which we had hidden. Overall all the kids went away with smily faces and a bag of new tricks.

Many thanks to all of our Instructors:
Joe "Atlas"
Finn
Brooksy
James Brown
and John Woodham.

Special thanks to all who sponsored the event:
Death Skateboards, Enuff, Es, Dwindle and Shiner.

For all of the pics of the week, click here to see the Easter Skate Camp Gallery

Summer Skate Jam Results 2006

August 20th 2006 showed a great reason why revolution should not be forced into closure.
This years skate jam brought in a diverse group of individuals from all ages who seemed to unite in the love of their sport.
I arrived at the skatepark at dead on ten 'o' clock to find the park already quite busy, i saw lots of faces I recognised and some new guys too.
As soon as I entered the skatepark I could almost taste the electricity in the air. Everyone was excited about the days up coming events. Around 2 o'clock the Jam format competition began, (Jam format being different in that instead of being judged on one 60 sec run you get 10 minutes with other skaters to prove your skills.) We started off with the under 16's and the level of skating was high the little rippers were definitely pushing themselves to impress the judges. The trick which sticks out in my mind is 14 year old Josh.P landing a Nollie Heelflip over the driveway just about as cleanly as possible.

The results for the under 16's comp are as follows:
1st Luke.B
2nd Toby.S
3rd Josh.P

The under 16's best trick comp was won by Bob Bennett who managed to pull off a crazy primo slide.
Then came the main event....the over 16's Jam.
The level of skating in this jam was far, far better than any i had seen from anyone at the park. Watching the warm-ups it was clear there was going to be a very high level of consistency and all these guys didn't fail to impress. Tricks that stood out were: Jack Brooks nosesliding the driveway ledge along and down, Aaron.S Rock fakieing the vert wall and Hazliegh Prebble 5-0 grinding the driveway box to 180 out.

The results for the jam were as follows:
1st Aaron.S
2nd Adwdh
3rd Dave Edwards

The Best trick blew everyone's mind. Aaron.S won it though with an insane backfoot kickflip over the larger driveway which was perfectly executed. The judges had a hard time calling this event due to everyone landing something that on another day might have won best trick.
Kieran Swain
For more pics of the event, click here
(BMX writeup and pics to follow)

Death Team Demo at Revolution

The Death Skateboard Team visited Revolution Skatepark as part of their promotional tour for their new DVD entitled "Escape from Boredom". The team were here to both perform a demo and to give the local kids the chance to skate alongside Pro-Skateboarders. As usual, they did both with smiling reckless abandon even as kids begged for everything from stickers to the shirts off their backs.
The team arrived at around 6.30pm and promptly steamed straight into the park to warm up for the demo and immediately whipped the kids (who had been sensible enough to queue up early) into a frenzy as another 150 people stood outside in the pouring rain to the sound of screams and yells of approval. DJ Loin was in attendance to MC the proceedings and to kick out some heavy metal tunes to accompany the demo. Eventually, the sea of kids parted in the streetcourse to let the Death Squad demo commence and yep, it really went off!
Rails were being krooked, lipped, tailed, nosed, you name it. Lee Blackwell was attacking the Deathbox and Wallride, 15 year old Ben Raemers was just destroying the streetcourse, Dan Cates threw down some of his traditional trademark tech-comedy tricks whilst Robbie Smith was foot-planting the bowl wall to fakie. Mark Munson ripped and slashed the mini-ramp as the delicate Dibble got smashed and thrashed around as always.
The Death team really pleased the crowd and skaters throughout the evening, eventually tossing out skateboard decks, t-shirts and stickers to an appreciative and frenzied bunch of kids.
Thanks to all of the pros from both the Death and Duffs teams who pulled out the stops to give everyone that attended, a really great evening.
Team:
Ben Cundall
Dan Cates
Nick Zorlac
Olly Tyreman
Ben Raemers
Mark Munson
Carl Wilson
Lee Blackwell
Dibble
Rob Smith
Steak
Mark Nicholson

For a gallery of photos of the evening, click here.

Easter Skate Camp 2006

Kids Half-Term saw the return to Revolution of the Easter Skate Camp, this time, in association with DC Shoes. The camp ran from April 10th to the 14th with over 15 budding young Skateboarders in attendance. The kids had a full 5 days of instruction to improve their skills ranging from basic to advanced tricks. Throughout the week, competitions were held in the street course, ramp room and outside ramp complex ranging from jams, best tricks, old school manoeuvres to best fancy dress and craziest skater. During the camp, the kids had a dedicated chill out area with the latest skate movies playing all day. It also gave them the chance to check out their own skating that had been filmed during the Jam sessions. Prizes and giveaways were plentiful courtesy of DC shoes who provided the kids with loads of goodies throughout the week which always gives the skating a boost. Thanks again to the guys at DC for their support for this event and especially to all of the kids that attended making the week an unforgettable one.

Easter Skatecamp crew 2006:
Matty B
Stig
Bob
Mercia
Jordan S
Finn
Charlie
Dan
Ben
Jordan V
Bruno
Jack
Michael
Hamish
Massimo
Oskar
Connah
Dave
Max
James
Ollie
Nicholas
Bailey
Ben B
Mark

Andy "Colgate" Barratt (Instructor).

DuFFs "Day at the Seaside" 2005

Under 16's
1st. James Mckone
2nd. Kasper coyle
3rd. Toby Shaw
4th. Alex Rickets
5th. John Woodham
6th. Andrew Markoll
Joint 7th. Harry Ramsey and bob Bennett

Over 16's
1st. Jamie Morley
2nd. James Isles
3rd. Ali Drummond
4th. Camp Phil
5th. Chris Hemple

Well done to them and to everyone that entered. hopefully everyone had fun, I know I had a good weekend and am looking forward to the next comp.
Thanks to DuFFs for supporting the event and supplying all the prizes. Thanks to Munson, Raemers, Cundall and Sam Bruce for judging and Cundall for MC'ing on the day.

Natural Born Skaters Comp/Jam 2005

The Natural Born Skaters Tour hit the park on Sunday the 5th of June. According to the organisers, the day turned out to be the best leg of the series so far. The standard of skating was extremely high from all of the competitors, most of whom were egged on by MC, Nic Powley, to risk their personal safety in exchange for new shoes, glasses etc..

The results of the day were:
Under 18's Street
1st Ali Drummond
2nd Dylan Ewing
3rd Liam Jaquin

18 and over Street
1st Phil Le Maistre
2nd Geoff Else
3rd Tim Gill

All of you that placed first, second and third have qualiffied for the final at Bay 66 in London on the 19th June.

Mini Ramp Comp 2005 (15-5-05) Click here to watch the video

Revolution Mini-Ramp Comp 15th May 2005
Ever since we started running competitions here at the park, people have always asked when we were going to do a Mini-Ramp competition. Well, they finally wore us down and decided to schedule one for each of the sports: Skateboarding, BMX and Inline, over the course of the summer.
First on the list was the Skateboarding event. The competition was split up into 3 groups; under 11's, 11 to 15's and 16+, all of which attracted entrants from all around the country. We were lucky enough to get the support of Mark Munson from Duffs who not only donated great prizes but also judged the event as well.
The event started off with the under 11's who had the choice of which ramp they wanted to perform on, most of which opted for the mini-spine. Prizes were won by Mercia for best effort (and for being the only girl to enter). The winner of the under 11's was Kiyah Turner who did the best all round runs on both mini-ramps.
The 11 to 15's was pretty much dominated by Harry Lintell who could have quite easily, placed in the top 3 of the 16+ group had he been old enough. Harry did some extremely technical tricks like Frontside Flips and Tre-flips to fakie. Bob Bennett won the Best Trick section with an extremely smooth Fakie Shuv-it to axle stall.
The 16+ group attracted some of the best Mini-Ramp skaters we've had in the park. Locals, Phil LeMaistre and Kieran Swain pushed themselves to the limit to impress the judges and the crowd. Kieran tried countless times to pull a Frontside 540 transfer from the high to low section on the ramp. Phil, not to be outdone attempted a 50-50 transfer and twisted his ankle in the process and after some ice, he continued to skate. Chris Marsh from Ashford did several good moves such as Backside Big-spins but failed to link his tricks together which eventually cost him the win.

Results

Under 11's
1st Kiyah Turner
2nd Joe Taylor
3rd Joseph Dyke

11 to 15's
1st Harry Lintell
2nd Ryan Hurley
3rd John Woodham

16+
1st Kieran Swain
2nd Phil LeMaistre
3rd Chris Marsh

Best Effort
Mercia Bennett

Best Trick
Bob Bennett

Thanks to everyone that took part and especially to the companies that sponsored the event who are:
Duffs Skate Shoes (Mark Munson)
Reef Shoes
Stateside Skates
J&R Sports
Globe Skate Shoes
Power Distribution
I-Five
Odessa Footwear
Adio Shoes
Shiner Distribution
A4 Distribution
Saltrock

Blind Demo (17-4-05)

Even up to a fortnight before, we weren't 100% sure that the team would make it down here. Seth, the team manager, after a few concerned phonecalls said "I will make sure it happens!" Being a man of his word, at 3.00pm on Sunday the 17th of April, the Blind Team arrived at the park.

The one thing you have to say about the US skaters when they visit is that they really make the effort to stop and talk to the kids. They answer any questions they get thrown at them no matter how bizzare, stand and smile as Mum takes the photo for the scrapbook, sign anything that is thrust in front of them and generally grin and bear it. No snide remarks, no tantrums or foul language, just the smiling, well behaved face of Professional Skateboarding, something that we cynical Europeans still have to master. Or is that what makes us, us?

After spending at least an hour doing the whole public relations thing, the team managed to make their way into the ramp room for an unbeleivable mini-ramp session.
Corey shepard was pulling the biggest Tre-flips to fakie on the bigger section of the ramp as well as massive Kickflip-melons to fakie. Jake Brown made a footplant off the wall and back into the larger mini section. James Craig was making f/s shuv-it's to nosestall and switchstance backtails.

After about 45mins of this, everyone made their way through to the Streetcourse with all eyes on Ronnie Creager. Ever since we saw him win the 2004 Globe World Cup Of Skateboarding, he has been the man to watch. Rodney Mullen was almost in tears as he spoke to camera about how much Ronnie deserved to win after years of work.
Skating with an ankle injury, he pretty much stuck to the big driveway for the entire demo. Not that anyone was dissapointed as he pulled switchstance frontside flips, hardflips and tre-flips over the entire length of the thing! Just to cap it off, he made the biggest damn kickflip, clearing the driveway by at least 3 feet, landing on the flat. The crowd went absolutely mental!

Jake Brown by this time, had made his way into the streetcourse and was trying to transfer from the small quarterpipe to 50-50 around the bowl corner. After 4 or 5 attempts, he landed squarely on the coping and slid it around to drop in fakie. It's a pity that we've not got the roof height to have a vert ramp as Jake Brown has to be one of the finest vert skaters in the world. If you watched him trying tailgrab 900's in the X-Games, you'll know what we mean.

The session progressed onto the handrail with Corey Shepard making clean kickflip f/s boardslides and James Craig taking the opportunity to learn b/s noseblunts while he was here, only taking 4 or 5 goes to nail one perfectly, much to the crowds approval.

As is usual with these things, there had to be the product toss. 3 decks and numerous sets of wheels and stickers flew into the crowd causing some of the biggest rucks we've seen over a deck. It took 2 park staff to lever away kids who had just a finger touching the deck. Everyone was happy in the end though!

All in all, an absolutely great day. Everyone got to watch and ride with some of the best skaters in the world and most importantly, kids got autographs and free stuff. Happy days!
Thanks to Seth from New Deal for making this happen and especially to Ronnie, Corey, Jake and James for their time.

To see more higher resolution shots of the day, click here for the Blind Gallery.

Diplomat Xmas Jam (18-12-04)

After trying to plan a Diplomat jam With Jamie for months we finally got round to organizing it for the week before Chris tmas, which when the day came, was a cold but sunny Saturday. The jam started at 6.00pm and there was a long queue of eager skaters of all ages from around the county. Everyone had a skate for an hour when the best trick in the street course started, there was a half hour jam and people where hitting up all parts of the course.

Baz was landing frontside nollie tailslap reverts on the quarter bowl, Si Woods popped shuv-it over the big driveway, Jean front blunt the flatbar and Dibble smithed the handrail. After half an hour, all the skaters moved over to the mini ramp for best trick session, again with a half hour jam.

The older guys really showed their experience with Gav Bush doing stylish handplants and frontside inverts. Many tricks were being landed making it hard for the judges to get a winner from the jam. The last hour consisted of mellow skating and chats about what just happened in the park.

Then to finish off an already great jam, there was the showing of ‘The Diplomat Movie' which is a really well produced film lasting about twenty minutes of the skating of the Diplomat team, most of the video is film of their travels through Europe last year.

The film ended along with the jam which was a great way to end the event.

The Winners of the two boards were:
Dibble with a flip front board on the handrail
Jean with a tre-flip to fakie above the coping on the mini ramp.

Thanks to all the guys at Diplomat for coming down for us and J.T for helping organize it, Nic(Sidcup) O.G Distribution for judging and everyone that turned up to watch and skate for the evening.

Skate Comp Results

The results of the 2004 WMD Skate comp are:
Novice:
1st Matt Collins
2nd Charlie Spelzini
3rd Jon Doran
Intermediate:
1st Chris Collins
2nd Harry Lintel
3rd Sean Csuka
Open:
1st Jamie Carr (pictured)
2nd Marc Cowan
3rd Ian Harris
Best Trick:
Alex Barton
Best Slam:
Gabriel. M

You can read a report about the comp below.

31-10-04 Weapons of Mass Destruction Skate Comp

The sun was shining and the skaters were out in force, with twenty people already entered before registration began which was a good sign for what was to follow, mass destruction!! Over fifty skaters entered the comp, which was split into three categories: novice, intermediate and open and everyone was getting fired up to impress the judges by going crackers in the street course.

It began with all the skaters warming up and checking out a number of different lines in the hope to win, both DJ Loin and Public Disorder (local rock band) were filling the room with best alternative beats and punk rock sounds. The skating was heating up so it was time to start the comp with the novice's going first.

It was amazing to see so many youngsters creating lines and using a variety of ramps to gain extra points, kids were attempting basic flip tricks to transfers and grinds, it's impressive to see the enthusiasm of the next generation of wannabe pro skateboarders! The Intermediate section followed with some real keen skaters firing around the park busting out big spine transfers, aerial tricks over the death box, flips on and off the banks.

It was also great to see some of the kids attempting several coping tricks on the quarter bowl, spine and quarter pipes, trying to incorporate all aspects of skateboarding. Finally it was time for the more experienced guys to take there minute run, this was a real pleasure to watch as guys had travelled from all over the UK to demo there talents and a few of the guys really had it.
The runs were smooth incorporating all the ramps and rails with technical tricks that you would see from professional riders, the guys really pushed it hard for a first place position.

Once everyone had had there minute run it was time for the final part of mass destruction which was a five minute expression session for each category where four judges would be watching for the best trick and best slam. It went off; all the skaters were killing themselves. Matty Collins from the novices was trying to frontside boardslide the new steep flatbank rail which was amazing as I think the board was as big as him.

Harry Lintel from the Intermediate's krooked the driveway extension box and Tom Brown blunt the quarter bowl and pulled a huge acid drop into the seven foot quarter pipe. In the open session Alex Barton smashed a front lip slide across the length of the middle driveway which was massive, Jamie Carr landing smith grinds, Chris Hemple Frontside flipped from the top of the death box and loads more!

Results were:

Novice:
1st Matt Collins
2nd Charlie Spelzini
3rd Jon Doran

Intermediate:
1st Chris Collins
2nd Harry Lintel
3rd Sean Csuka

Open:
1st Jamie Carr
2nd Marc Cowan
3 rd Ian Harris

Best Trick:
Alex Barton

Best Slam:
Gabriel. M

Matt Collins Novice 1st Place and absolutely stoked!

Chris Collins Intermediate 1st Place (yes he's Matt's brother)

Jamie Carr Open 1st Place (Yes he is smiling...sort of)

Overall it was a great day with loads of prizes for the winners and runners up and also a massive product toss which gave everyone who entered a chance to get some free stuff. The Revolution team want to thank all the skaters who took part in the comp and all those who helped sponsor the weapons of mass destruction.
Revolution would especially like to thank the following Sponsors:

Death
Duffs
Globe
Minute Skateboards
Dirty Dog
Karma
Reef Shoes
Etnies
New Deal
XZube
Stateside

For more photos of the event, click here!

Skate Camp Video

Skate Camp
For those of you who are interested, the streaming video of Summer Skate Camp is now available to see in the video section of the gallery. The video is only suitable for broadband connections with Windows Media Player. If you ask really nicely when you come in to the shop, we may even play it for you on the telly!

2-10-04 OG/Snickers/Crossfire/Xbox demo type thing......

If this is your car... We're really sorry.
Hang on, It's parked on double yellows!!!!
Ha Ha Ha....... Sucker. That'll teach you!
And let that be a lesson to all of you who dare to park your posh cars away from the rubbish ones.
Well, its 3 days later and my ears have only just stopped ringing and my head hurting. If you are in a similar condition, you would probably have attended the OG/Snickers/Xbox/Crossfire event we had on Saturday 2nd of October. It was one of those events that just seemed to snowball out of control in a controlled way from day one. First, Powley from O.G set up another demo from his lads, Phil Young from Snickers got wind of it and chucked in a load of dosh from Snickers, Zac from Crossfire then decided to join in, making it one of the stops on their 3rd Birthday tour and oh, by the way, he's bringing this band with him who have been supporting "The Rasmus" on tour. Oh.. and a load of Xboxes. Ok then....

Thanks to Snickers, the first 100 people through the door got in free (not 200 as an over eager local reporter wrote). Sorry to those of you that missed out but "early bird and all that". This meant there would be a queue forming at some point, little did we realise that the line that went out of the door and down to the end of the car park would not get any smaller for over an hour. The lads kept the line entertained by throwing large amounts of chocolate and stickers at them which after about half an hour started being hurled back at them. I guess there are only so much free chocolate and promotional goods that you can take in one day.

I think that the biggest clue about how loud the band were going to be came when the shoes on the display rack in the shop started falling off as the bass player was warming up. Andy dug out the largest pair of ear defenders he could find and promptly placed them on his head until 10.00pm just to be sure. You can always tell the ones that have been bought up on a diet of dance music when they crumple in the face of pure ROCKKKK!!!! I mean... just look at this man. Does he even know who Ted Nugent is?
(Actually, I asked him and he didn't).

By now, the Xbox terminals had been set up in the games room and were being furiously sessioned by wide eyed little kids fuelled by the chance to win a console and a copy of Tony Hawk Underground 2 (Thug2). Little Pete looked like he was on course to win one with a score in the 250,000's until some local bad lads came in and smashed that with scores up in the 3,000,000 range…. Gutted! By the way, has anyone tried to buy an Xbox in Thanet recently? I have, without any success I hasten to add and spent around a Fiver in parking in the process. After a whole day of dealing with spotty chav shop assistants, I gave up and bought a PS2 instead…. Not really, although I was extremely tempted to. Anyway, enough of my problems and back to the story……

Skateboarding!!! That's it….. That's what the day was about, I nearly forgot! So easy to lose sight of the important stuff on days like these with so much going on. Skaters from all over the country turned up for both the O.G demo and the Snickers best trick comp although it was extremely difficult what with all the noise to tell exactly which was which. Local lad Mac, who had his front teeth knocked out last week, got taken out again by a flying Paul Churchill who I have to say, looked horrified at what had just happened. Mac was taken out with a lump on his head the size of an egg after bleeding all over the new ramp only to return at the end of the night for the free stuff. That kid is hard!

Si Woods Crailslides as Tony and Bam look on in approval

The skating by now was really going off. Rory Milianes was blowing everyone away with b.s. smiths to flat on the driveway box with smooth 360 flips on the new hip. Another mention has to go to Paul Churchill who managed to rock and roll the vert wall! Ben Cundall, who has been a recent addition to the regular faces here at Revolution, was flying around with his usual enthusiasm, making smooth f.s. smith grind variations around the bowl section and b.s. smiths on the driveway rail.

Rory Milianes

Brandon Ryall was making big kickflips over the rail on the big driveway and all manner of grinds on the picnic bench. Ross McGoughn had a fine repertoire of tricks he pulled out of an ever expanding bag including: Nollie Heelflips, Nollie Flips as well as b.s. flipping the new hip.

Brendan Ryall. Salad on the Picnic Table

(Above) Ross McGoughn Ollie North

The standout of the day has to go to Chris Oliver, overall winner of the Snickers Best Trick Comp who did all of the following moves on the picnic table. Kickflip b.s 5.0, Kickflip b.s. tailslide to fakie, b.s. nosegrind reverts. Zac from Crossfire did his best to cope with a P.A system that decided to semi-destruct 5 minutes before the start, keeping the crowd amped and informed interspersed with some mighty fine tunes. Good work that man!

Chris Oliver. Winner Best Trick

Zac Leeks. www.caughtinthecrossfire.com

After the best trick comp had finished, everyone made their way through to the ramp room where special guests Hiding Place had set up. The best thing was seeing the looks on some kids' faces as the band kicked off. Even I have to admit that it was loud. Maybe it was just the fact that the ramp was acting as a natural sound funnel, but I swear I saw some kid look like he'd been poked with a cattle prod as the first snare drum hit. The band, although loud were excellent. They had very tight, good songs and a front man that actually looked like he believed in what he was singing about. They seemed very popular with the female audience too judging by the amount of signed bellies at the end of the evening.

All in all, it was a blinder of a day and if you knew about it, but didn't bother to show, you really blew it!

Thanks to all who took part, Skaters and Industry guys; Nic Powley from O.G. Distribution, Phil Young representing Snickers, Zac Leeks from Crossfire, The guys from Xbox (sorry, didn't catch names), Hiding Place and BMG Management and last but not least, the people that came to see the whole thing.

Cheers everyone!

From L to R: Phil Young, Pete King and Nic Powley (as if you didn't know).

Death Skateboards Team Demo

The Death Team boys arrived on the 27th of August for a visit. Whilst they were on the way down here, the crowd had already starting to turn up, arriving an hour early just so they could see them turn up. Ben Cundall was the first to arrive and rode the mini ramp with the kids, already putting on a show for them, pulling off massive frontside indy-nosebones on the extension on the mini as well as some fast technical grinds. The kids were already impressed and the rest of the team had not even got here yet!
	Ben Cundall
	The team turned up to a herd of kids surrounding the car, the Death team is Nick “Zorlac" Orreccio (the team manager), Dan Cates, Lee Blackwell, Wag, Mark Nicholson, Horsey and Ben Cundall. The team started off by getting some food because they had been travelling all day and stuck on a flooded motorway, they were all starving. They soon ventured into the street course, cruising around warming up to get ready for the demo. After about half an hour the team were ready to go, the kids stopped skating to give the guys a chance to impress the crowd. Wag and Dan Cates started the demo by nailing a few good tricks. Horsey
Dan Cates	Wag
Wag was hitting kickflip to noseslides on the driveway block and front tail shove-it’s on the far flatbank extension. Cates was pulling off transfers out of the far quarter pipe to flatbank extension noseslides and k-grinds. Horsey was starting to warm up with a disaster noseslide on the driveway block, then hitting the quarter bowl transfer with some frontside Indy’s and attempting alleyoop 270 Indy’s but did not quite get them down. Mark Nicholson was now on the Streetcourse, busting out his 80's rocker look. He was pulling off transfers out of the far quarter pipe to the far flatbank extension's front smith grinds, frontside 50-50's and 5-0's, he then managed to pull off a nollie hardflip revert on the big flatbank. Ben Cundall started to hit the driveway handrail landing feebles, crooked grinds and backside smiths as well! He then ventured onto the bowl pulling of some sick grinds frontside smith's then frontside smith reverts and then sticking frontside smith tailgrabs out of it. Gnarly bro’!!!!
Nick "Zorlac" landed a sick frontside air to disaster on the far quarter pipe, then pulling off some old school tricks like big frontside boneless on the flat bank and some scary tailblock stalls. Wag then put some more tricks down landing a frontside flip nosegrind on the driveway block and then a frontside tail stall kickflip in on the far flatbank. Dan Cates was then trying to feeble everything in sight, first on the flatbar on the driveway, then along and down the driveway block. Dan then tried a pivot fakie on the top of the flatbank and stuck it down but on the way back down; he got too much speed and came flying off his board. Ben Cundall
	Nick "Zorlac" Orrecchio
	Lee Blackwell started off with some huge melon grabs over the death box, venturing onto the far end wall where he landed a huge wallplant out of the far quarter pipe landing it clean! Then, in the same run, he goes back towards the far wall and lands a kickflip wallplant to bodyjar. The crowd went mental because they were the sickest tricks of the demo and they were done one after the other in the same run. Lee then headed towards the foam pit and he was trying 540 melons which he got close to a couple of times. When he was trying them on the death box, he was trying them fakie and after a couple of goes he managed to stick one down, the crowd loved it! Lee was stoked as well because he had never done one before. He then transferred from the spine to the flatbank! The gap was huge but he managed to frontside Indy across the gap.
Lee Blackwell	Horsey
There were a few more good tricks after this by Horsey like some huge grabs out of the quarterbowl and some amazing technical flips from Cundall. Mark Nicholson was just hacking it around the park doing a few grinds around the place, but the guys were getting tired so they called it a day.
	The team then went to their van and pulled out loads of goodies for the crowd. We then had a massive product toss, throwing out stickers, badges, key rings, t-shirts and finally threw out a deck and everyone went mental! Kids were flying all over the place trying to get this thing eventually ending with a bundle and members of staff trying to pull out the winner. We eventually managed to pull him out and luckily it did not end in tears. The team then signed autographs and took pictures for the fans, then scrambling into their car, tired after a long days’ work, and drove home.


Winner	Loser
Revolution would like to take this opportunity to thank the Death Skateboards team for their time and applaud their professionalism and enthusiasm whilst here at the park. It was a pleasure having you guys here and just to say that you are welcome back anytime! Good work Fellas!

Summer Skatecamp Ends...... Hooray!!!

Summer Skate camp has now officially ended after a week of madness and strange clothes.
You can read more about it here and check out the camp gallery:-)

Karma Team Visit

The Karma team stopped by for a visit recently..............

Revolution Trailer Trash Comp (Sunday 25th April 2004)

On Sunday 25 May, the “Trailer Trash” was the first skateboard competition to be hosted by Revolution Skatepark for 2004. The weather was steaming hot and anticipation ran high waiting for the events of the next few hours. The 50 competitors that travelled from as far as Birmingham received their entry numbers and went through to the street course for a warm up session. Special guests this year were Public Disorder (a young local rock band), who got skaters and spectators rocking to some classics. After just over an hour of warm-up the comp kicked off with the Novice category. This year’s event had some talented young skaters that were flying over the jump box and doing tricks on as many obstacles as they could hit in 60 seconds. More skaters than ever before were doing grinds and flip tricks which got the crowd and more advanced skaters screaming.
Once everyone had their run, they got the chance to attempt a “Best Trick” to boost their points. Little 8 years old Tom Granger used this well with a large drop (for him) off the Death-Box to the floor. Shortly after, there was another quick warm up for the intermediate and open categories. Public Disorder started playing and Intermediate group began. Once again, the standard of the group has risen dramatically since the last competition. By now, everyone was landing such hard tricks that you could even hear the crowd from the other side of the building in the café. It was really hard to choose the top three as it was such a close call between everyone in the group.
Finally the time had come for the Open category. Ranging in age from 13 to 33, the Open is the hardest group to win and featured 10 of the best skaters from Kent and parts of the UK. Every skater had a different bag of tricks than one another which made it much harder to judge than the Intermediate.


Jamie Carr: Open 1st


Alex Drummond: Intermediate 1st


Mac Cole: Novice 1st

After the Open had finished, everyone skated together trying all the tricks they just saw in the comp. The judges in the meantime were adding up the results and also selecting the winners of the best trick and worst slam.The results were:

Novice
1st Mac Cole
2nd Dylan Ewing
3rd Tom Brown

Intermediate
1st Alex Drummond
2nd Josh Griffiths
3rd Craig Cogley

Open
1st Jamie Carr
2nd Baz Gutzwiter
3rd Nicholas Bedwell

Worst slam
Toby Christian

Best trick
Phil Le Maistre


Toby Christian: Best Slam Winner	Phil Le Maistre: Best Trick Winner

Open Winner, 13 year old Jamie Carr, won a complete Skateboard set-up and has also been given a sponsorship deal with Diplomat Skateboards! This just goes to show what you can achieve at competitions! (Even more reason to enter next time!) Best trick went to local lad, Phil Le Maistre, with a death defying high drop out of the rafters into the big flatbank. Worst slam was performed by veteran ripper Toby Christian with a trick attempt out of the quarter pipe to bowl, falling straight to the flat onto his knees and side.


Stickers!!!	More Stickers!!!!

Just before the end of the event, there was just enough time to do the traditional sticker and product toss which gives everyone a chance to leave with some goodies in there hands.
Revolution would like to take this opportunity to thank the sponsors of the competition who really did us proud and look forward to the next one sometime later in the year!
In no particular order:

Es
Unabomber
New Deal Distribution
Adio Shoes
Nixon Watches
Joe at Projects
Shiner Distribution
I-five Distribution
Reef
Gratis
Dirty Dog
Stateside
Oakland Imports
Extreme TV

O.G. Distribution Demo 29th Nov 2003 (Video in Gallery Now!!!)

On Saturday the 29th of November, over two hundred Skaters queued in the pouring rain to see the return of the O.G Distribution Teams at Revolution Skatepark. Top U.K. Skaters from teams such as: Potato Wheels, Ortega, Boarderco, Sabotage and Juice Clothing, started their demo at 7.00pm much to the delight of the crowd.
Little Ben kicked off the evening by Miller Flipping over the spine ramp followed by Lee Blackwell doing Frontside Airs from the Vert Wall to the Flatbank. The Skaters were pushing each other to the limit to do better tricks with the encouragement of the screaming spectators. Each Skater landed a wide range of tricks on the different obstacles in the park including Marc Churchill, who managed to Smith Grind the entire length of the Round Rail.

Rory Milanes Frontside Flipped the Driveway. Tom Ball landed a Feeble Grind along and down the Round Rail. Tom Crowe, after nearly killing himself a few times, landed a 50-50 around the Quarter Bowl, off the end of the bowl to flat (6ft drop)! Ivan Rodrigues-Marques was doing Backside Shifty’s over the big Driveway and Flip-Nose stalls on the Flatbank block. Mike Sutcliffe, Frontside Aired the steep quarter pipe and Joe Habgood became the first person to ever Rock-Fakie the Vert Wall (which incidentally, measures in at: 15ft high with 4ft of vert). Lee Blackwell was also the first to Axle-Stall said wall! Ross McGowen Kickflipped the big Driveway and Back-lipped the Flat bar at every attempt. Unfortunately, one of the Skaters (Naylor), shattered his wrist trying to Boardslide the Driveway rail.

At the end of the 2 hour demo, there was a sticker toss with t-shirts, hats and 3 decks being thrown into the crowd. Every Skater performed to the best of their ability for the crowd who left far from disappointed. It was a good to exit 2003 on this kind of event and hope that this is an example of what is to come in 2004.
Thanks to O.G Distribution for taking time to put this event together and to all of the Skaters who gave up their Saturday night to entertain us. Cheers Lads!

Revolution Skatepark Winter Skate Comp 2003 (Video in Gallery Now!!!)

On a cold, wet Sunday morning, the 3rd Skateboard Comp at Revolution took place. After a long warm up, everyone was up for skating the park’s Street Course and landing the biggest tricks. The Comp started with the Novice section. This year, the standard was much higher than previous competitions with Skaters such as Harry Burger doing transfers over the spine and Thomas Brown landing a big Indy over the deathbox. 3rd place went to Harry Burger, 2nd to Andrew Quinn and 1st, Thomas Granger.

Next up was the Intermediate section. Everyone that entered this section Skated their hardest, making it extremely tough for the Judges to pick a winner. The toughest tricks were being landed by Skaters like Josh Jackson (Kickflip Fakie), and Samir Oukill (Nollie Heelflip to Fakie on the Flatbank). 3rd place went to Adam Parsons who Kickflipped off the Deathbox. 2nd place went to Chris Marsh after Nollie 360’ing the Driveway and Nollie Bigspinning the Quarterbowl. 1st place went to 13 year old Jamie Carr with a virtually perfect run with big grabs over the Deathbox, frontside grabs on the Quarterbowl, Blunt to Fakie and a big Boardslide on the rail.

Time now for the more experienced guys to Skate in the Open category. Once again, it was a very tight battle with Skaters like Rob Cameron Smith-Grinding the square rail and Matt Thompson both Boardsliding and Nosesliding the ramp. Toby Christian was dropping into the 14’ vert wall and Phil Le Maistre, Acid-dropping into the Flatbank from the roof girders. Unfortunately, Phil, who placed 3rd, didn’t make it during his run but had another go straight after the comp and made it! 2nd went to Danny M from Ashford. Danny was pulling big Backside Melon-Grabs as well as 50-50’s on the square rail. The winner of the open actually entered himself into the intermediate section but was transferred to the open section for obvious reasons. Frenchman, Jonathan Moisant, was landing huge Melon Fakies on the Quarter pipe, 360 Melons over the Deathbox and Tré-Flips over the small Driveway. The prize giving was presented with the traditional Sticker-Toss with loads of goodies being chucked out to the 200 plus spectators. Overall, it was another great success; the standard of Skating has improved immensely, which considering that the last comp was only just before the summer, is extremely gratifying to see. If you were there, we hope that you enjoyed the event. If you want to see more, let us know and we’ll arrange another.

See you next time!

Revolution would like to thank everyone that took the time to enter the Competition as well as all those of you who came to spectate. A special thank you has to go out to all of our Sponsors for the event: Nestlé, Animal, Vans, Etnies/Emerica, Shiner, Reef, New Deal, Stateside, Deathbox, J&R and Gratis.

Think Team Demo. Tuesday 8th July Revolution Skatepark

This was probably the shortest notice we’ve ever had to organise and promote an event like this, so when 150 screaming sticker hungry skaters turned up to meet these guys from the U.S. we were shocked if not a little stunned at the response.
It had to be one of the stickiest, sweatiest days of the year so far which everyone assumed would slow these guys down, but were we wrong! “What music do you want to skate to then”? Asked Andy “Colgate” Barratt. “Metal” was the reply. This pretty much set the tone for the next 2 hours as the boys went balls-out to impress the crowd.
Danny Fuenzalida, Justin Williams, Jake Nunn and Jason Masse basically tore the place up, which seemed to inspire our own Bobby Brewin into action who started the evening off with a Rodeo Flip over the Deathbox. Along with Kickflip Mute Airs, Air to 50-50’s into the bowl section, 180 nosegrinds on the square rail and Smith Grinding the Driveway round rail, he had a pretty good evening and much respect from the Think Team.
Breakdown of best tricks follow:

Danny Fuenzalida
Frontside feebles and frontside bluntslides on the driveway round rail.
Kickflip Frontside nose slides and backside tailslides on the old fun-box square rail.

Jake Nunn
Backside smith on the driveway round rail.
360 flips over the driveway.
180 ollies over the driveway rail.

Jason Masse
Backside nosegrinds down the square rail.
Backside 180 nosegrinds the length of the square rail.
Pop shuvits over the large driveway.
Backside lipsliding the funbox square rail.

Justin Williams
360 flip to nose stall on the top of the far flatbank.
Nollie backside heelflip on the large flatbank.
4ft Frontside air out of the bowl section.

The one thing we really have to say is that you would be hard pressed to meet a nicer bunch of guys than the Think Team. They signed anything that was put in front of them, threw hundreds of stickers out as well as shirts and a set of Venture trucks to one gob-smacked kid who was last in the queue for autographs. That evening, we took the lads down to Broadstairs for a few beers to show our appreciation for a great demo and judging by the state of them the following morning, they got the message.
Thanks especially to Chris and Marc at Shiner for organising the whole thing for us, if they have any other teams half as good as the Think guys, we’d be only too happy to have them!


Jason Masse Backside 180 nosegrind

Jason Masse Nose Grind

Jake Nunn FS Boardslide	Danny Fuenzalida FS Bluntslide
	Justin Williams Dishing the goods