Skateboarding
Skateboarding
Rip through the architectural marvels of Belarus with Cody Lockwood's crew
Rob Wootton, Max Kruglov and Marco Kada join the talented Mister Lockwood in search of wild spots and Soviet skate museums in Europe's least-explored country.
Belarus is to be found snuggled, geo-politically speaking, between Russia, Ukraine, Poland, Lithuania and Latvia. It's pretty much as Eastern European as it can get. A relatively young state, Belarus started the recent page of their history in 1991, when the USSR collapsed.
You can barely find any skateboarding clips or even photos from Belarus online. One of the main reasons why this was the case used to be visas. Belarusian visa acquisition was once very complicated until a few years ago when Belarus suddenly became visa-free for five days, a change which was recently extended to 30.
For us, this offered a sudden green light for the organisation of an internationally-stuffed, cross-Belarus skate trip. A mere matter of a couple of months later, we all pitched up in Minsk, Belarus’ splendid capital.
Marco Kada – Nollie Heelflip
© Alexey Lapin
Rob Wootton – Kickflip
© Alexey Lapin
Roots and culture
© Alexey Lapin
Cody Lockwood – Frontside Air
© Alexey Lapin
Belarus is, in many regards, still a conservative place which respects its past. For that reason it can occasionally look more Soviet than modern Russia itself – Belarus indeed used to be part of the USSR. Most of the architecture and public spaces share that original Soviet look. For anyone interested in Soviet Modernism, Belarus certainly is an interesting place to go.
Minsk turned out to be a great playground for skateboarding – especially good for marble, granite spots and plazas.
Inside the USSR Skateboarding Museum
© Alexey Lapin
Cody Lockwood – Kickflip
© Alexey Lapin
Marco Kada – Frontside Noseslide
© Alexey Lapin
Cody Lockwood – Frontside Kickflip
© Alexey Lapin
One spot that really stood out was an old artificial concrete river, which ran downhill for a couple of kilometres and used to be kayaking facility. It's a long concrete ditch shaped like a mountain river with banks and transitions hidden in the middle of a forest.
Alas, not all of it turned out to be skateable, but some parts of that concrete masterpiece looked as if they were made to be skated. Cody and Russian skater Nikita Sekh, who came all the way from Moscow to join us, put skateboarding footprints into the history of that spot.
On our last night in Minsk, we visited the USSR Skateboarding Museum. Local archivist Gleb Bentsiovski has managed to create an absolutely unique collection of Soviet-era skateboards and associated artefacts. He told us stories about the mass-production of skateboards behind the Iron Curtain during the Cold War.
Despite their isolation, skaters in the USSR share an impressive passion for skateboarding.
As you can see from the nationalities of our crew, nowadays skateboarding is global, but it's important to remember roots and to keep doing it in the name of fun!
Click on the player above to get among part one of Matthias Reich's awesome double-header from another skate trip that reaches the parts others can't, and click here to watch the second part of our skater trip right around Belarus!
