Skateboarding - Bristol - 1982/3

These images go back to 1983/4 I think, at the time I lived in Frome in Somerset, yes where Jenson Button comes from, no never met him. Back then the nearest skateparks were in Bristol, Bedminster and lockleaze, lockleaze consisted of a deep bowl with between 3 and 5 ft of vertical and a tight capsule halfpipe, it was also in one of the dodgiest areas of Bristol. The pictures below were taken at Bedminster, it's changed a lot since these picture were taken, probably for the better.

This is Dave 'Spex' Agg, he was one of the hardcore locals, with a huge bag of tricks that he could throw down on any given day, Dave was always performing for my camera. Invert Air. Most of the riding went down on this metal quarter pipe, the run into it was a steep slope made from pathing slabs, the rest of the park was either very mellow or completely useless.

The park was a throw back of the late 70's skatepark explosion, built by people who hadn't a clue about skateboarding or skatepark construction, but who built them anyway. Dave Agg, frontside air.

These were taken on one of those days when hardly anyone turned up at the park, there were damn few skaters then, as the craze had passed and the death of skateboarding had already been proclaimed at the end of 1979. We kept skateboarding, we loved it, we really didn't give a monkeys what people thought or often said to us about our 'toys'. Dave still skates, he must be in his mid to late forties, his son skates, I know of a few others from that time in Bristol who never truly put away their toys.