Some of Cloverdale’s Ollie North Skate Shop team showed up at Surrey’s best skate park Chuck Bailey to ring in the New Year on January 1st, 2013 with a cold and nasty night session. The air was thick, the ground was slick, and the boys were layin’ down tricks.
Jordan Strong, Ryan Barron, Matt Cook, Shawn Beaupre, Mitch Salter and Shawn J – representin’!!
Here’s a quick little video of 3 of the Original Team Riders from Team Protest – Jeff Cole, Cisco Gooding and myself Hippie Mike. Finally after revamping the Team and bringing on Jordan Strong as the filmer many months ago, we get a taste of the good old days. Protest Skateboards began in 2001 and these 2 were my top choice for representing my company along with Jon Irvine. Between the 4 of us we showed unique skills, technical talents, crazy obstacle choices and reckless abandon. With Jon back in Ontario now, he’s still a part of our Team and always will be, but it’s tough to do the long distance thing for filming and such. It’s been a great run over these past 10/11 years of Protest and it’s really only just beginning. Hopefully this little video will stoke these 2 awesome skaters to come out more when we’re filming and get some footage going again. Low and behold there will be a Protest Video released in 2013, so they’re gonna have to, pressure’s on now…
Jeff and Cisco skate the Ramp
34 years old, 27th year on a skateboard. It was nice to get to skate with someone the exact same age as me, with the same amount of experience, but who hasn’t gotten overweight and lost his pop like myself. Thanks Paul Machnau for reminding me that age is just a number. Unfortunately, I can’t erase all the massive injuries that have slowed me down over the years, but I’m happy just rippin’ around and throwing down the occasional banger. There’s one thing I know about being a “Skater for Life” is that your life constantly changes, and you gotta just go with the flow. Good thing we have amazing places like Seylynn Bowl and Griffin, Queensborough, Chuck Bailey and White Rock where us old dudes can go and just surf as fast as possible and not worry about obstacles, ’cause I feel lately like I’m really losing my street skills.
Either way, it was a beautiful sunny day last Thursday and we headed out to skate one of my all time favourite Skate Parks – Tsawwassen. I skated this place so much for the first 5 years it was there that people actually thought I lived in Tsawwassen. So many tricks on the lock there it still amazes me what I can land there that I wouldn’t try anywhere else. Jordan Strong, Ryan Barron, Justin James, Paul Machnau, Chris Haslam and the Birthday Boy himself – Hippie Mike all tore it up that day with the park to ourselves. It was great to skate with all these guys that have all been part of my life at different times and eras.
Thanks for the fun birthday boys, check the video
Protest Skateboards Filmer Jordan Strong put out this little teaser video strictly named “2012” portraying the chaotic times he had over this past summer going out with all his friends and gettin’ clips. There’s a lot more of the chaos displayed than the skating, but that’s okay, that’s the life he chose. Featuring all the Surrey Loc’s like Calvin Dignard, Dale Kind, Mitch Salter, Ryan Barron, Jay Mykyte, Andy Anderson, Brad “Fighter” Muscat, Jordan Strong and more. Check it out
With this weather going back and forth and being completely unpredictable we had to pick and choose where we were skating on Sunday. It was a toss up between Tsawwassen Skate Park or White Rock Res, so we chose the quieter one. Still a bit puddley when we first arrived but that was not issue for these Protest boys. It was Andy Anderson, Jordan Strong, Jaden Easton-Ellett and myself Hippie Mike just chillin’ at the Res. Andy and Jordan threw down a couple lines while Jaden and I stuck to what we do best and only rode the nasty obstacles.
Enjoy
It was the first closed in bowl with coping in Surrey, and when it was in the planning stage for the Guildford Park I was very adamant that we got a Bowl. There was too much of the same street stuff popping up everywhere and those parks get boring after a while. So Guildford Bowl was built, along with a tiny, somewhat pointless Street Section. Of course now you have to be thankful for the street section because that’s all that will be skateable for the next year and a half until the construction is complete. Once this Lap Pool is built then New Line will come back and build something fresh for us to ride in the remaining footage between the building and street section.
This Park helped to teach a lot of the young kids in Surrey how to hit coping. I remember when it was new and at my Hippie Mike’s Tour de Surrey Contests there the young kids would all avoid the Bowl and just ride the street stuff, and now almost everyone focuses completely on the Bowl at those events. It also created a group of friends that localized that place, Allen Handley, Myke Johnson and Randy. These guys all know how to shred this spot. It’s a shame that we’re losing it, but life goes on.
Here’s the Video by Protest Skateboards of our Final Film Session at Guildford Bowl. Lots of people showed up including Andy Anderson, Brad “Fighter” Muscat, Jordan Strong, Dale Kind, “Giver” Michael James, Riley Allen Clerihue, Adam Lewis, Josh Lewis, “Hasbrown” Mike Shulze, Dustin Locke, Derek Mayer, Stephan Burke, Matt Cook, Ryan Brynelson, Bachouch Michael, Myke Johnson, Randy, myself and Allen Handley who absolutely destroyed it all day. No one will miss that Bowl as much as this guy.
I’m not completely sure when the fence will go up and the Bowl will come down but it could happen at any given moment, so take your chances and get there for one last session
R.I.P.
You down with BCP? Yeah you know meeee!!
If you don’t know what BCP stands for then you definitely were not there during the eras of destruction at Surrey’s own Bear Creek Park. Back in the day, even before my time there, some serious tricks used to go down. Back when Clint Proulx used to be skinny and knew how to fly, blasting Benihana’s over the big volcano – everybody would go huge there. People always say that Bear Creek was a bike park, that’s ‘cause they don’t understand how to ride those obstacles properly. Clint Proulx, Chris Bone, Scotty MacIntosh, Ben Wheeler and others all created what that place was about in the ‘90’s. Then came the era when people stopped airing so much and tricks were getting more tech, Jay Mykyte, Stu Benoit, Drew Boyle, Joel Chamberlayne and myself set the standard for the young bucks in the new millenium. And then kids like Scotty Tyson just learned everything. BCP was an amazing park to be a local at, and still today lives on as one of the most unique skate parks I’ve ever skated. So many tricks I can think of that I need to go to Bear Creek to do, because that obstacle doesn’t exist anywhere else. That’s awesome.
Just to reminisce the old days, Jordan Strong and I hit up one of my fav parks so I could toss down some memories…
BCP!
A few of us Chuck Bailey Locs went to peep out the new Skate Park in Coquitlam, Mackin Park last Friday. Luckily there weren’t too many kids there because it’s tiny and you can see in the video how much they get in the way. I had my back brace on so I could skate, and everyone had a good time. I found a lot of the obstacles hard to get speed for, and others tough to go slow enough. I’m not the most excited about these small back and forth parks when they come out but I’m sure I will give it a shred every now and then. It was me, Cisco Gooding, Jordan Strong, Fighter and a few friends, Calvin killed it…
At the end of June, my awesome filmer/team rider Jordan Strong emailed a link to this online contest that Lucky Surf and Skate Shop was having where you film, edit and enter a video part up to 3 minutes long. I tortured Jordan by taking him to some of the nastiest street spots around every day when he got off work and getting him to film me, but that’s the way I skate. We worked hard together to make this part, and of course we filmed way more footage than we needed to. From bare foot skating to riding the yellow slide, and I even pulled out the 2×4 skateboard for the first time n years, it’s a must see for creativity.
Jordan and I also went out a few times with Andy Anderson and we got enough footage to put a part together for him too. This one really shows Andy’s ledge and rail skills.
We all worked hard and the parts were submitted the day before the deadline. Then we received word that only 4 people submitted videos to the contest, including the 2 of us, so they are hooking us up with $150 each to spend at the shop.
Thanks Guys!!
And thanks to Jordan for workin’ hard last month. At least we had fun making them.
Enjoy the videos
Hippie Mike
Andy Anderson
One of the moments I long for all Winter every year is getting the tarp off my ramp. It’s a luxury to be able to float a tarp over the ramp all winter so that we can skate it any time we want but it’s two completely different worlds – tarp or no tarp. When the tarp is up, it feels more like you came out just to skate, not to hang out, and you skate more like you’re on a mission. When the tarp isn’t up, you’re surrounded by the beauty of nature and the atmosphere seems way more relaxed and you just skate to have a good time. Plus everyone can actually see the ramp from anywhere in my the yard and we don’t all have to crowd into the floating fortress. We had a good chunk of the Protest Team come out to enjoy the first tarpless skate session, Jordan Strong, Cisco Gooding, Brad Muscat, Jeff Cole, Jaden Easton-Ellett, Andy Anderson, and of course myself and Carrie were both there since we live here.
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I love where I live and the fact that we can even have this funky mini-ramp and make tons of noise all the time with no complaints from anyone.
Skate to live – live to skate.
Summer’s finally here, tarp’s finally off. It’s gonna be a beautiful Summer.