Laura’s been getting busy in the Forty Five kitchen. The first ‘test’ batch of Skate Further hoodies are winging their way to their new owners. A great garment, with soft flock white vinyl decals, this is one distance girl’s attempt to clothe you all for £20 a pop. If you are interested - look out on the forum for when the next batch is announced!

We are proud to be running an event (via Nat) in New Zealand. Nat has been living in NZ for 6 months now and has kickstarted the Longboarding scene in Christchurch. Garden City Sessions now has over 200 members and the regular sessions are pulling 20-30 skaters each time. This is the first push race and so with the help of Skatefurther’s Laura and the wonderful people at Forty Five, we have been able to supply the competition with stickers with all proceeds going to producing t-shirts for their amazing scene.

Here’s to the South Island’s first push race. May there be many more. You can find out how it all goes on the forum thread and keep an eye on the FB event page.

To Ben, Rob and Zoltan - remember to stop for these.

Love from everyone else at Skate Further xxx

PS: Hit up their site here!

Lookit how many people turned out for the Philadelphia Push Race! The 8 mile course was conquered in 28 minutes by, you guessed it, a Bustin rider, and here’s what Holesom team rider Katie Fry had to say about her own experience of the day:

” I had an awesome time racing. I ended up finishing within the peleton of skaters. There were a lot of LDP present today which was really cool. The Bustin crew from Brooklyn NY tore it up, their top finisher won the race with a time of 28 minutes on the 8 mile course. I finished in 49 minutes which is my personal best time. It was an awesome experi2ence and Im excited to keep on progressing with the sport!

Not content with being the gnarliest skaters at Skaiti, or scaring the bejeebers out of distance skaters country wide in advance of Goodwood Roller Marathon, Team Orsum have done more miles in the UK than any other skateboarder this summer. 1000 miles, from John O Groat’s to Land’s End, in a mere 21 days. This takes 5 days off Ben Stiff’s time, and it is testament to the team effort (both support and skater!) that the lads made it in (mostly) safe and sound in such a short time. Visit http://www.justgiving.com/orsumjogle to show them some love! Well done guys, love from all at Skate Further, including your very proud team manager *wibble sob*

Skatefurther Laura sends us this Orsum update from a support vehicle in Northern England

Yo there from the road! Team Orsum are screaming along the JOGLE route, skating 508 miles in ten days. Ridiculous! We are going through WIdnes just now, on our way to a spa treatment centre for some serious toe love.

Here’s the latest episode from our friends Aaron, Paul and Adam. For more information visit Longtreksonskatedecks.com, supported by Rayne Longboards and Orangatang Wheels. Episode 5. Adam writes…

Skateboarding uphill for 3 days proves an actual possibility—now time for some Downhilling!
This episode includes bad pavement, diarrhea, scrapes and bruises, and the first showers taken in 4 days (Electric shower. Whoo hoo!)—Aaron falls in love and quits the trip.

This episode was the TURNING POINT FOR ME.  At the end of this Episode when we are sitting on the ledge after going up and down our first huge pass that was 79 miles of uphill with the highest elevation being 14,400 ft pass, I felt we could do and accomplish anything.  Bring it on!

Leading up to that though, when we got to the restaurant, it was only noon or so. We stayed there the whole day. Hahaha! We were all just so beat and tired and could not get ourselves to go back outside into the rain and cold.  Aaron and I both had bad diarrhea, and that sucked.  We bonded with the family that owned the restaurant and we ate a lot of food—just kept on eating and eating.  And by “food” I mean cookies, French fries and egg sandwiches—that is all they had. We were thankful nonetheless. That night the family let us sleep in a small hut they weren’t using.  Paul and Aaron shared a lopsided bed and I took the floor.

Christopher Vallender, Skatefurther’s man in Europe has got himself a Bustin Strike and has written a comprehensive review in the eyes of a distance skater. Chris’s blog Here & there - Ici & là: European longboard adventures is worth a read and has some excellent reviews of gear and the adventures he gets up to. You can find out mor about Bustin on their website and through their facebook page

The guys at Bustin are also behind PushCulture, something were here at Skatefurther can see going a long way. PushCulture was formed around the simple notion of getting from A to B on a board. It covers events, personal stories and daily life getting around on a board.

You can find out more on the PushCulture site and on their Facebook page. Keep your eye out for Travis’s blog entry (Travis, like Christopher, has used skatefurther.net to make his own personal blog - a great idea!)

At the same time as the US Ultra was happening in Seattle, a bunch of Skatefurther forum members in the Netherlands decided to give an Ultraskate a go. The results were pretty amazing.

Jesse Beau, 325km (331km counting the 2 laps his GPS failed)
Paul Brunninkhuis, 290km
Arjan Koek, 270km
Jochem Boer, 255km
Edwin aka Wizzy, 202km
Joost GT, 201km

From our reckoning 4 out of 6 skaters made it into the Ultraskater.com top 10. Jesse becoming the newest member of the coveted 200 mile club! From the pics it looks like a good time was had by all, I’m sure we will get a full write up on the 24 hours in the forum soon.