ASK THE DOCTOR Dr. Rick Blackhart
THRASHER
STYLE CONSCIOUS
After reading your reply to the English
bloke in the Dec. '83 issue where he talks
about why some old skaters don't skate
competition anymore. Good subject and I
liked your reply. It is the cash that really
matters after all. My question is do you re-
ally like the pros we have now? I admit
some guys tear. J. Gibson, L. Mountain, S.
Caballero, etc., but overall the quality
lacks. I myself, after hangin' with the likes
of Potato and Olson over the years, tend to
thrive on the aggressive surf-skate style.
Some tricks done nowadays are lame. The
names of the tricks, too. Anyways, I would
rather see lots of carves, many lapover
grinds and real cool frontside air (around
the leg preferred). Personally I can't stand
the way Tony H. skates-too many boink
tricks and not even any mean shit. You
used to compete in Pro events, did well too.
How many eggplants did you throw? I dig
your grinds and roll-outs. Style counts with
aggressiveness.
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Skate High
Orange City local
Blackhart demos the compass
method for drawing transition
templates.
I've always thought that aggression
should be the main factor in judging. It's
a shame to see robot skaters. I think
there's still a lot of skaters that abso-
lutely tear it up. And that's what it's all
about. As far as other skaters and nam-
ing names I'd rather not, although I think
Tony skates pretty hot. What do you ex-
pect from a guy his size? He's too small.
to be mean; anyway, thanks for the let-
ter.
RAMPS ON TV.
I have a big question to ask: When is
skateboarding going to be on TV.?
I've been skating six years and only seen
it on TV. three or four times. Also, I heard
HBO covered the Great Desert Ramp Bat-1
the comp. I want to know if it will be shown
across the U.S. When you live way up here
in the sticks, it's hard to pick up moves by
pictures. The second questions is: On a
ramp would wafer board sheeting, exterior
grade, be alright with plywood over it? This
is because there are (wafer board and chip-
board) companies all over the state and it's
about $5 cheaper. It's about $6 for a
sheet, $44" sheet. Plywood is pretty ex-
pensive. Keep up the great work and I
would greatly appreciate your answers.
Thank you
Tim Morin
ME
I've had several inquiries as to why
there is little or no skating on TV. It
seems to me that every time skating is
on, I always miss it. The Great Desert
Ramp Battle was filmed by a local at-
filiate of H.B.O.; apparently it never has
been shown. Television is definitely a
big factor in skateboarding's future, as
far as becoming more widespread, pub-
licly, than it already it.
About the ramp surfacing-if what
you call wafer board is anything like par-
ticle board, then I wouldn't suggest
using it. Mainly because it will not bend
with the transition; of course you could
use it for the floor of the ramp, but if it
gets wet it will deteriorate. Now if you're
talking about just exterior grade ply-
wood, that would be fine with more lay-
ers of a better grade plywood over it.
Use one inch tongue and groove ply-
wood for the floor with half inch on the
transition and then a layer of three
eighths inch plywood and quarter inch
masonite over the whole thing and
you've got one hell of a ramp, also an
exhausted bank account, later.
'NUFF SAID
A few friends of mine and I are tired of
having to travel for long hours by cars in
search of a ramp or for that matter anything
skateable (other than streets). I even put a
piece of wood on a three foot wall in my
backyard to tide us over until we buld a
halfpipe. That gets me to the real question.
Could you send me some instructions on
building a halfpipe? (That tells how many
sheets of plywood, and how thick, etc.)
Thanks
S.P
San Rafael, CA
Well Steve, you're in luck. In fact every
skater who's written me a letter about
blueprints or plans for a ramp can now
build his or her own ramp, with the new
"How to Build a Ramp" booklet availa-
ble now from Thrasher. Includes dia-
grams and plans previously printed by
Thrasher plus complete step-by-step in-
structions and hot action photos. So if
you want to do it to it, send two ($2.00)
bucks, for material worth hundreds to:
THRASHER, P.O. Box 24592, San Fran-
cisco, CA 94124; then get out and start
pounding nails.
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