Longboarding: What's in a name?

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet." 

- Shakespeare: Romeo and Juliet

Why is this called a motorcycle:

and this too:

and this as well:

when this is a skateboard:

but this is a longboard?:

Isn't a longboard just a long skateboard?

So what IS in a name? How did a longer than average skateboard known as a longboard eventually come to be considered a completely different vehicle altogether? Why do so many “skateboarders” hate “longboarders”? Other than equipment specs and terrain preference, surely they all have more in common than not, especially when they are compared to other sports.

There was a time when skateboarding was not so divided. Skateboarding legends and pioneers such as Tony Alva would happily ride pools, halfpipes, fullpipes, skateparks, streets, banks, or whatever else was available and he would compete in events such as slalom, downhill, freestyle, high jump and barrel jumping (!). Nothing was “gay”, it was all simply part of the fun activity called “skateboarding”.

But somewhere along the line a kind of tribalism infiltrated skateboarding. It started to become an “us vs. them” mentality, and skateboarding became more aligned with underground cultures such as punk rock. At the beginning this wasn't such a bad thing as it injected new energy and creativity into skateboarding, plus it was a bit of a practical marriage borne from the need of people who felt like outsiders to band together for mutual protection from a mainstream culture that could be extremely hostile to those who dared be different.

But as times changed and skateboarding became mainstream and the industry began to make a lot of money, things started to get confusing. "Street” skateboarding began to be considered by many to be the only legitimate form of skating (at least as far as most skateboard companies and the media that supported them was concerned), and young senses of self were being formed by identifying with an increasingly limited number of channels of expression. Skateboarding was becoming the exact thing it rebelled against in the first place: a narrow minded culture where peer pressure was exerted on those who dared to be different.

So perhaps it should be no surprise then that the appearance of longboards on the scene should create waves. Out the window went the by then standardized size and shape of a typical skateboard. Out went the standard tricks, terrain and even clothing. With longboarding, a new attitude reigned: anything goes.

The irony of course is that this attitude was not at all new. It was just new to the skaters who grew up being told by their peers and by the skateboard companies and by the media that “THIS is skateboarding, THAT is NOT. THIS is what a skateboarder does, THAT is NOT”. Definitions which were often rather abritrary. 

This resistance, the digging in of the heels against change is likely the result of a fear of losing one's self concept, a self concept that comes as much from the person focusing more on who they are NOT rather than who they ARE. The more they can narrow down that negative definition, the closer they feel to knowing who they are and where they belong. Unfortunately, narrow definitions of self usually result in narrow minds, and among other not so great things, narrow minds are just plain boring. Isn't skateboarding supposed to be the antithesis of boring?

Skateboarding, longboarding...tomayto, tomahto....whatever. Let's ride. -Kaiser

Darkspeed is Back!

Rumors of Darkspeed's demise have been greatly exaggerated. Darkspeed is officially back and this time we're serious. Better late than never.

Back in 2008 we were just a couple of skaters mucking around in the garage, making our own slide pucks to put on gloves we modded ourselves. After some experimenting with different plastics and shapes we found a formula that was extremely slippery but also lasted extremely long. It didn't cost us much more to make a couple dozen pairs of pucks than the few sets that we had intended to make for our personal use, and thankfully our friends at Local 124 put the extra sets we made up for sale in their skateshop.

Remarkably those first sets sold out in days and a business was born. By late summer our pucks had made it all the way to the Maryhill WA World Downhill Skateboarding Championships and on to the hands of many of the attending pros including the eventual champion's. Darkspeed had rapidly reached the world stage and we were on our way.

After seeing how many pro riders were buying Darkspeed pucks to replace the stock pucks that came with the new gloves that they received from their sponsors, it became obvious that we should have our own glove to be the perfect companion for our pucks. Low on cash, we solved this problem in the same DIY way that we started the pucks: we went into the garage and started experimenting with ways to "soup up" a stock pair of mechanic's gloves into decent slide gloves that could take the kind of beating downhill skateboarders dish out.

It was a lot of work to modify the gloves but when the first batch rolled out in the spring of 2010, an amazing thing happened: just like the pucks had done two years previously, the gloves took off immediately. Once again strictly via word of mouth in the longboarding community, requests for our gloves started pouring in from around the world.

Unfortunately the timing of the new glove's release coincided with a couple of events that almost stopped Darkspeed in its tracks just as the train was leaving the station.

Within a couple days, one of Darkspeed's original founders had to resign due to time restrictions, and the remaining partner severely injured his leg playing skateboard hockey at the Danger Bay race. Being on crutches made getting around extremely difficult, and so manufacturing gloves and pucks, taking and shipping orders and all the other chores related to running a growing business by himself was overwhelming. But rather than quit he enlisted team rider Nick Breton to help make the pucks and gloves to fill as many of the orders that were coming in as possible. But it was still not enough. We had to turn down at least a dozen orders for every one we were able to fill.

So at the end of the season the decision was made to design a glove from scratch and have it manufactured in a proper factory. Pro team rider Patrick Switzer helped test the prototypes and gave good feedback until we got the glove just right. This new glove debuted in the spring of 2011 and was an immediate hit because it was a properly designed slide glove with the kind of features WE wanted as riders.

However throughout 2011 and into 2012, the badly injured leg and other lingering health issues continued to plague Darkspeed and its ability to keep up with increasing demand. For the sake of getting healthy it was decided that Darkspeed would be put on hiatus for awhile. Going from a backyard hobbyist to an internationally known business in such a short time was a wild ride that we were completely unprepared for. Darkspeed became a victim of its own sudden success. So the next step was to enlist experienced business people with the same passion we have for making Darkspeed run like a true company.

And that is where we are today. We eventually found the kind of people that can inject new blood into Darkspeed so that it can hopefully continue on the rapidly rising path that it had been on preceding the hiatus. Much has happened in the two seasons since we were more active on the scene but we are confident that our products are still the best out there and that quality and performance are still the most important things to riders (along with cool looking designs of course). We are looking forward to the future because despite our early success we feel we are still just getting started. We have a lot of exciting ideas beyond slide pucks and gloves and clothes that we are working on that we know will be exciting to other riders too.

Check out our new website where you can purchase gloves, pucks, T Shirts and Hoodies: http://www.darkspeed-concepts.com/