Skateboarding

Skateboarding Skateboarding Skateboarding is one of the most unique, enjoyable, and physically demanding sports in the world. Like baseball, basketball and football, skateboarding his endured many changes and fluctuations in popularity, and has emerged as one of the most entertaining and satisfying activities enjoyed by both today’s youth and its adults. The goal of this paper is to inform about the history, evolution and present state of skateboarding. The concept of skateboarding was invented in the 1950s when surfers from California wanted to try their surfing techniques on land. All over California, surfers and teenagers began constructing their own “land surfboards” by attaching roller skate wheels to wooden crates. The surfers would then ride down steep hills while in the crates, performing surfing moves as they went down. This idea, however, was a painful one. Wooden crates did not provide the necessary range of motion to equate to surfing and, consequently, many surfers were injured while experimenting with their new invention. As a result, wooden surfboard-shaped boards were constructed. A pair of roller skate wheels were attached eight inches inward to either end of the board to add stability while riding. One day, a young man named Alan Gelfand revolutionized skateboarding. While skateboarding, board, wheels, sport, skateboard, skateboarders, one, surfing, own, land, became, while, surfers, skate, ollie, back, wooden, undergone, try, teaches, roller, riding, parks, off, now, new, make, made, kids, just, it’s, decks, crates, boards, alan