Spring cleaning and some new threads
Happy New Year to everyone (a little late, I know). Let’s kick this year off by showing you some of the contents of my stocking:
Thanks to the brilliant Gbemi Ogunkeye from Longboard Europe/London Longboards I will be able to shred in style as soon as the t-shirt weather comes back – not for a little while then:
I’ve been following with baited breath the developments coming out of the Axcelspring kitchens. I ordered a few sets of the Axcelspring washer cups which have replaced my tired and ill-fitting old washers (old on the left, new Axcelspring on the right):
At, Griffin Skateboards, we have noticed there is a problem with the standard truck washers & washer cups on all stock skateboard trucks today. The grade 8 washer’s and grade 8 kingpins in combination with bushing that are too soft are hanging up the kingpin and snapping it. Old traditional washer cups surf around on the bushing and the cup and on the kingpin too much. It’s about time we have a state of the art washer cup that works to help the rider be safe. The center sleeve puts the pressure on the center of the bushing giving it more energy. The facing is the rings on the top and the bottom that gives extra grip to grad onto the base plate and the bushing. No movement equal straight power. It’s made in the USA in a one inch size and machined from 303 stainless steel. These washers will bring your LDP, slalom and downhill setups to life and increase the responsivenesss of your trucks.
Here is a pick of the old washer/truck setup to show you exactly how much difference there is:
Same truck setup with the new washers – no slop and no play either:
There are two sizes of washer which means that you don’t have to stack washers anymore, each set comes with a star washer to fit underneath the kingpin nut:
Last but not least is a set of 3dm Avilas in 75mm (unknown duro and reason for lathing) that were very kindly sent to me by Bevilaqua from Sa Ka Roulé.
These are sent with an aim and to ensure I take part in the Endomondo Avila Earthquake Challenge for the fastest 10km skated with these wheels. I’m ready to rock and will hopefully get a skate in this weekend, weather permitting. Why not join in?
Big thanks to Bevilaqua, Gbemi for their generosity and and to Thane at Griffin Skateboards for the quick order processing and postage!
Descent2
Feels like things have slowed down in this last week, but despite the feeling there is still some stuff to write about. Last Saturday I attended my very first longboarding event in Lausanne: Descent2. As far as I can make out, it was co-organised by Lausannedescent.ch and La Fièvre/Skatepark HS36 and was very good afternoon out. Being my first DH event, I didn’t know really what to expect but it was really chilled and everyone I chatted to was really friendly.
The event was held at the Vallée de la Jeunesse, which is a curving road, closed to traffic which winds it’s way down to lake-level. It is the perfect event to go to if you want to try your hand at some of the tamer downhill runs that Lausanne has to offer. More experienced riders can also practice in an environment which is free from traffic or uncertain road surfaces and ‘have at it’…
Just for the record, that’s not me…I was on my G|Bomb and mainly there to get a flavour of what was going down. I did get to meet some lovely people including long-time skater and all-round nice guy Stephane Conus. Stéphane had been on hand with some really good advice when I was looking at moving to Lausanne. Incidently, a big thanks goes out to Bevil’ from Sakaroule for putting me in touch with him. It was great to cruise the lake route with him and put in a few ‘k’.
Along with the much needed BBQ stand a few longboarding brands were showing off their wares. Some were well known (Sector9 with the great ‘Push don’t Pollute’ t-shirts) but others brands less well known. Two Swiss makes represented; LGS Skateboards which showed some awesome carpentry skills and F-9.81 with some carbon-foamcore-concave-dope-ness. I was representing PSD which raised quite a few eyebrows:
As well as longboarders, there were quite a few people on luges, lots of inliners and something new to me drift-trikes – it is as crazy as it sounds. Big up goes out to some of the organisers I met: Nicolas Gachoud and Natan Lakonishok.
Spoiler alert, here are some upcoming things:
This, this and this..;-)
Here & there - Ici & là 
