Local 124 Longboards Edmonton and Skateboarding News
Barrier Lake: An Albertan GEM
Written by Jeff Sanders
Tuesday, 06 May 2008
On Saturday May 3rd 2008, another meeting of Calgary and Edmonton longboarders took place at a true Albertan GEM ... BARRIER LAKE!
Barrier Lake Freeride/Safety Clinic
9 of us Edmontonians woke up way too early in the morning, met at Local 124 and headed off on a roadtrip to meet 13 of our longboarding brothers from Calgary for a day of seriously rad freeriding bliss in kananaskis.
Barrier lake is a fast hill that will test both your cornering abilities and your nerve. It starts with a slowly curving steep downhill with speeds maxing out around 70-80km per hour just as you have to drop into a left turn that is well beyond 90 degrees. From there the road narrows first into a tight two lane road and finally into a choice of single lane routes that wind and twist down through the trees to the lake shore. There are multiple paths that can be taken and the thrill of the g-force pulling you through the corners never stops.
As it was still early in the season the roads were closed off to traffic which allowed us to have a full day in our playground of paved paradise. The fact that it was a freeride made the day even better than any race could have been. We all got sooo many rides down the hill! What a day to build skills and confidence in preperation for the upcoming race season starting with Danger Bay on may long weekend!!
Probably the craziest heat of the day involved the Godspeed Boys - Ty and Andrew and Nick Breton from Local 124. They cornered basically on top of each other and at ridiculous speeds. Nick ended up having to take an unnatural line and couldn't pull back from his drift in time to avoid flipping hitting some rocks and flipping head over heels into the ditch. He was fine except for the chunk out of his JimZ! All three of these riders are riding awesome and will definitly be hungry to steel a podium from the coasties this year.
Ross the Boss set up the event and we all owe him and the rest of our hosts from Calgary a hell of a lot of thanks. YOU GUYS ARE AWESOME!!!
(Mike Shaw won the award for bail of the day as he flew face first into a tree, exploding his helmet and shredding up his lips - WEAR YOUR HELMETS!!!)
