Neufathlon#

Mon, 06 Mar 2006 12:00:00 +0000

It's funny how my perceptions have changed in the last year or so, but basically I've turned into a skate snob. Today I went to Club Blue Room and to Decathlon in search of something I might consider buying and wearing in Sardinia when the pain from the Simmons grows too great, and, well, couldn't find anything. Decathlon in particular are either winding down/scaling back their skate department, or have just had a run on all their high-end models (there were a fair number of holes in the display): I don't think they had anything in stock costing more than around £120, and practically nothing with wheels bigger than 84mm (there was some astonishingly large and lumpy Powerslide thing with 90mm wheels and that was it). And no FSKs at all: not that I had any intention of buying another pair of FSKs, but they are generally regarded as good skates in their field, and Decathlon at least used to carry DeeMax. Tomorrow I shall head out to Skate Attack and see if they can do better. The ideal, I suppose, would be Fila M100 or K2 Radical 100 or something like that. Or maybe even the Powerslide R2, which are supposed to be a lot more comfortable than most speed skates. If I do get customs it's apparently still going to take several months between order and delivery.

I borrowed some FSKs on Friday after it became obvious that the bike was bust but before we realised exactly how bust (about half the spokes on the back wheel) intending to ride it back to its secret hideout and then catch the skate up. Not that I got the chance, but I did skate for a mile or two back to the pub afterwards to meet everyone else, and it felt weird. Imagine wearing slippers with castors on the bottom: about that much responsiveness/feedback from the road surface, and about that much willingness to change direction on a whim. (Of course, anyone reading this who's wedded to their crossmax will be saying "hyperbole" about now, and they'd be exactly right too. I'm not proud of what I've become)