The contest was a complete success! We were able to get a lot of new kids onto skates, and we showed them just how amazing rollerblading can be and how tightly knit our community really is. Since the competition, skaters in the Houston area have reported that some of the kids who received donated skates are showing up to weekly skate sessions and skating home-made ramps and rails to get the basics down.

New blader!

Another new blader!

Gemma McDaniel, one of the recipients of skates, gave her account of the Donate and Skate comp, “One day my Dad, lil bro, and I decided to hit up the Galveston skate park cause we’ve never been and thought it’d be a great sport to get into for the winter (we kiteboard, and it’s no fun getting in that water in the winter, so we thought skating was perfect). My little brother and I were contemplating skates or a skateboard, long story short we showed up at the skatepark and met Mike Dew and Joey Rensland and they told us about the Donate and Skate comp. So the next day we hit up Conroe skatepark and after seeing everyone with skates just shredding it up we were totally sold on blading! It was an awesome experience, everyone was super chill and friendly (it was really similar to our kiteboarding group) just like family. And not to mention I got a sick pair of blades out of it!”

Trying these things out.

Brian Lackey and Dorian Deshay helping out a new roller.

I want to give an extra special thanks to Jeff and Jessica Buckner for all their help with the contest. I could not have done it without them. They helped out with registration for the contest, assembling skates, and they also promoted every day leading up to the contest. Jessica’s sister even put fliers for the comp on Papa John’s pizza boxes to get the word out!

It is small steps like these that will get rollerblading back to where it needs to be. You don’t have to hold a huge contest to get new kids into rollerblading. Got some old videos or magazines laying around? Why not turn some scooter riders or skateboarders on to what rollerblading is all about? Got an old pair of skates you’re not using? Give them to a random kid at the park looking bored; let them try them out and they might fall in love like we did. We can all play our part and spread the rollerblading gospel to the masses.

Thanks again to all our sponsors for their support with the competition:
Sic Urethane, SDSF skateshop, ONE Magazine, Aggressive Mall skateshop, Circolo wheels, Remz skates, Ground Control frames, Razors skates, Be-Mag, Jug liners, Ramosong 10 and Bulletprufe denim.

— Kevin Little