History of the London Skate

April 2002

The London Skate was started by a bunch of friends who all used to play hockey in the Park and came up jointly with the idea.  Having heard about the Paris FNS, and looking at the numbers of skaters in Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens, they decided that a similar street skate around London would be a popular event.

As the interest in street skating grew, a few of the guys went on the Paris Friday Night Skate and were simply blown away.  This event was so amazing and so much fun that there was no choice other than to start a night street skate in London as soon as possible.  Sure, the skate would no doubt take a while to reach the tens of thousands of skaters found in Paris and Munich, for example, but the principles should work just as well in London.

This led to some ideas on planning and marshalling, and the skate was put together.  The original group who started the London Skate included Greg Miall, Simon Hill-Norton, Vish Vishvanath, Rob Sherwin, Mark Sherwin, Sam Sherwin, Rick Clare, James Mayhew, Patrick Meyer.

Simon Hill-Norton at the Swan in 2000

London Skate meeting in March 2001

The skate was called the Bettyblade Wednesday Night Skate, and was launched with pink flyers throughout London, and especially in the Park.  SweatyBetty girls (Ciara and Lisa) were in the Capital Radio studios on the launch day holding up messages for Chris Tarrant to read out about the skate which he did.  The skate was also the lead article in Time Out that week, and featured in numerous shops, including SweatyBetty, throughout the summer.

The dreaded officialdom...

The week before the first event Simon got called by the Royal Parks Authority who said they wanted to see him.  During the meeting they started every sentence with 'The reason that you can't so this is.....'!  Next, Simon met the Metropolitan Police who were incredibly helpful from the start.  The skate organisers have stayed in close contact with them ever since, and email the planned route to them before every skate.  On the day of the first ever skate, a courier arrived at Simon's office 3 hours before the skate was due to start with an official letter from the Parks stating that the skate was banned!   Because the mass of skaters collected in the Park would not disburse, in the end the organisers were forced to go ahead with the skate in spite of this warning .  Of course, with an official notice delivered only 3 hours ahead of the skate, there were lots of skaters who could not be informed and thus turned up for the skate.  Given that the skate only started and ended in Hyde Park with most of the skate taking place outside the park, the Parks officials didn't have much to do with the skate anyway.

Right from the start the organisers have taken safety incredibly seriously.  The routes are all skated beforehand, how to negotiate junctions is planned, etc.  The skate has first aid and crowd control training, and of course has a core team who run the skate and marshal it brilliantly.  It is growing now but maintains the founding ethos - a fun skate in a non competitive style aimed at beginners and intermediates.

Marshals...

Let's not forget the awesome marshals, who've made such personal dedication and have all gone to a lot of effort for no reward other than to help other skaters in London have a good time.  Thanks a lot to you guys, there are literally hundreds of skaters in London who really appreciate the effort you've put in.

In 2000 the skate was marshalled in a fairly unofficial manner with little formal organisation, which wasn't needed until the skate really exploded beyond everyone's expectations in the summer of 2000.  That was the reason that a big meeting was called for the start of 2001, where a formal approach to the problems of organising a big street skate was adopted.  This included things such as:

• Walkie-talkie training to enable marshals up and down the length of the skate to communicate with each other.
• First aid training
• Official marshal jackets
• A formal approach to skate navigation, with a front and rear set of marshals, others along the skate, and designated teams of blockers who race ahead to block off each intersection until the skate has passed, and then go ahead again.
• At this time a decision was made to force the entire skate onto the street, and keep skaters off the pavement.
• The marshals were divided into two teams, each responsible for alternate weeks, and run by Mandy "Pink Hat" Hall and Shaun Hunter.
• The skate was renamed "The London Skate".

Some of this approach was based on the Paris and Amsterdam Friday Night Skates.  You can read more about the Amsterdam Friday Night Skate here.

Marshal training in 2001

Marshals at the start of the first London Skate in 2001

Video

Check out this video of the London Skate.  Be warned, it's 13MB so a big download.  The coolest streetskate party in town!

More information:

More detail on street skates can be found in this general Q & A.

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