LATVIAN SKATE NETWORK
Working on Viss Safe in May and early June we couldn’t squeez a May top 10 vid. There were even a contender for number one place, but it didn’t work out. Anyway June has already passed and top 10 is back in full mode. June 2019 is over and it is pretty clear where most action happens in Riga.
Cover photo by: Aivo Liinsoo @aivojeez
For this year’s Go Skate Day RajonTV went to Estonia to skate in Tallinn’s rad Metsakooli DIY park. The plan was to film a regular RajonTV reportage with funny interviews and cringy moments. It started pretty well, we met a bunch of cool locals, we learned that Skateboarding day is like Mothers day (you don’t need it, but it is good to have anyway) and that Latvians have six toes. We also had a lot of “Oh yeah this is a great event. We are having a good time!” and “Let’s get it!” moments. Also free beer at the event messed with our neurotransmitters making a simple task of talking seem complex. Long story short the interviews turned out rather dull and boring.
Nevertheless, we manged to have a conversation with Samuel Oja, one of the builders of the Metsakooli DIY. Samu told a bit about how they started and how it went from illigal to lagal.
P.s. On the Estonian note:
Make sure you don’t miss Viljandi Bash which is coming next weekend. More info on the official website. We are also stocked to announce that we will screen Viss Safe video on Saturday at the afterparty. See you there.
Viss Safe premieres on 14th June at K-suns at 19:00. Get tickets at Clockwise and Tikari before the premiere. We are going to sell remainig tickets at the entrance as well.
The video is almost ready and now is in the final editing stage. Looks like it is going to be up to 40 minutes in length, so a lot of action is installed.
The main cast of the video includes: Mark Voronenko, Fricis Štrauss, Meelis Erm, Ed Gaba, Pavels Berezjuks, Rudolfs Rorbahs, Niklavs Vetra, Krišjanis Kalvans and Miks Grantiņš. Of course there are a lot of friends footage etc.
We plan more than one premiere, so if you can’t make it, don’t worry we will have more screenings.
Viss Safe – our upcoming video has been announced in May and the premiere is coming in June. The first trailer is out, and if you still haven’t seen it, check it out. The cast of the film has not yet been disclosed, but it is probably obvious if you follow the local skate scene. We can say that Mark, the walling construction worker above, will have a section in the video. The video is at the editing stage at the moment, but it looks like it will be close to 40 minutes in length. So yeah, a lot of to see. We also plan more premieres, definitely want to hit Liepaja, Vilnius and maybe Tallinn. We’ll see.
Vilnius based filmer Martinas Agafonovas released a street edit to celebrate the start of a new skateboarding season. Great edit with cool shots and nice tricks. Einius Žiūkas did long curb grinds and nollie heeled out of that tall ledge, Mantas Vaškelaitis was seen in the video too.
Also Einius got to a new sponsor and a released a welcome clip.
Latvian television made a pretty decent report about Madars. He reveals some insights on how much he gets paid and stuff. Only in Latvian with no subs.
Arturs Bogdanovičs skated over at Miera darzs park. Did only two heelflip variations. RajonTV is disappointed 🙂
While Riga receives its 4th skatepark, Tallinn just got its first. First good one that is. According to our connections, Tallinn has three outdoor concrete parks at the moment. They all opened at the same time, last year November. However, locals (at least our connection) are not happy with the quality etc. Local core skate heads mostly skate that Koidu plaza in the clip.
Wild spot explorer Ronalds Mazitis came to Riga. He is a Steady Chiller and he shows that in his latest vid.
Davis Valpeters and other gang members skated at the Barax and made this black and white edit. Davis also pulled a nollie heel crooks over at G-Tiim ??
Armands Baumanis continues to release weekly podcast episodes and the most recent one featured RajonTV’s uncle Bob. Although there was one episode in English with Mindaugas Lukaševičius the show is in Latvian. But Rob’s episode was pretty cool and we translated one of our favorites quotes from it.
Armands: Is there anything you dislike about skateboarding?
Bob: Yeah, yeah there is one thing I dislike. Right now, my trucks don’t go straight. They turn a bit and I don’t like that.
Speaking of Armands, he got a new sponsor deal with Stinky Socks. Good fit.
New season means the begging of the contest circuit. The biggest contest in Latvia is the Vans Skate League which is held for the third year in a row. There are four events in the contest and the first one, over at Barona park, has already passed. It was pretty fun. There’s a video and a photo gallery.
May 2019 must be also remembered as a big moment for women’s skateboarding. Nike SB released their first full-length women’s video titled “GIZMO”. Finally women in skateboarding get more recognition and get into the spotlight. Skateism posted an interview with Lacey Baker about the film.
Have a great time everybody. Summer is finally here, so let’s not blow it!
Imanta district, in particular the Imanta’s skatepark, can be considered the place where RajonTV has started. The place served as the location for early RajonTV videos as well as the stomping grounds for a lot of local skaters. People learned their first tricks there, popped their first beers and had a joly good time only to get beaten up by local urlas later. The miniramp has hospitalised a lot of people and a lot of flat made it possible to fit everyone.
For many years Imanta’s park was one of the main skate hubs in Pardaugava and when it finally ceased to exists, Pardaugava became deserted and kinda left behind. Besides LNB there were no good parks and spots to skate in this part of Riga. Now this is going to change as less than in a month Imanta district will have its new amazing park from Mind Work Ramps.
The new park is claimed to be the biggest concrete plaza in the Baltics. It has a lot of standard park elements, as well as some more unique things. Like the fountain shaped manny pad. The highlight of the park is the epic bowl, which is definitely the best bowl in Riga, maybe even Latvia. The park opens around Ligo. We are already excited to see new talents that the park is going to generate. Definitely predict an encrease in scooter kids, but a few skaters too.
Episode 10 of R.USH HOUR is with Clockwise skateshop’s rider Ingūna Skujiņa. She has a mad flick, slams hard and shreds!
How long have you been skateboarding?
About 3 years.
Sponsors?
Clockwise skateshop.
Favorite thing to skate?
Honestly anything where I can get a trick.
Favorite trick?
Fakie fs flips with no pop into or down something small 
, switch flips on flat.
How did filming for R.USH HOUR go?
My back has been hurting now for the past 5 or 6 months non stop so pretty much every session is painful, but Gaba hyped me up the whole filming time so it was pretty sick!
We proudly present you the first teaser for RajonTV’s upcoming full-length video VISS SAFE. The project has been technically in the making for the last 3 years and will showcase safe skating from Riga skate heads and friends. We will disclose the full cast closer to the premiere which is coming really soon.
Madona is a small city in Latvia where for the last 8 years a contest called Aldoņa Rībinieka Piemiņas Kauss is held in the local indoor park. The fact that a small city like Madona has an indoor park is pretty interesting and makes you hypothesise about the people who run it. Since it is impossible to make money running an indoor, especially in a small populated city, logical conclusion is that those behind the park are crazy enthusiasts with a lot of heart for skateboarding (or some other similar activity).
RajonTV visited the contest with a goal to skate, find out how the park came into being, and find out who Aldonis Rībinieks is. At the park we met Arvis Trečaks, the force behind the contest, and it quickly became clear that he is a big fan of skateboarding and everything connected to it. We interviewed Arvis and he told us a lot of interesting insights about the park. So what was a simple plan to film a short report from the contest turned into a ten minute documentary clip.
Enjoy.
Cover photo by Liidia Maier/ Kristo Õismets -Kickflip
Hope you guys are having a good time and skating a lot. Spring is here and there are no excuse not to do all that. Today on a surprise rainy day (in Riga) we can chill and recap some memorable events from April 2019.
Event in Madona coming this Saturday.
Original Riga board shop Boards.lv was keeping in pretty quiet for a while, however, they have released a new team edit recently from the Spot center.
Meanwhile in Tartu, Aleksandr Tubin and co. destroy their indoor park. That park where Romario beaten up that flat rail. Andris threw a real gangsta move – ss heel bs 5-0. Props.
Estonias got a visit from American skate beasts Ben Hatchell and Lizzie Armanto. What a great inspiration for the locals. The duo did couple of demos around local parks and hung out with the kids.
In Lithuania Boardsports shop released a video of their team cruising around. Don’t know much about this, but check out the video to see what’s up.
Fully Ghetto released a new clip with the likes of Lukas Matusevičius and Žygimantas Rudys skating Kaunas.
Clockwise skateshop was a part of an Urban festival in Agenskalns where they organized a small skate event. That was the event where Fricis flew over a fence into the street.
If you are into serious olympic skateboarding make sure to follow the new Latvian Skateboarding Federation instagram. :p
Armands Baumanis has been killing it with his podcast show Straight Forward Podcast. New episode comes out every week and until now he has talked to a couple of Latvian skaters including legends Rudolfs Henčels and Egons Avots. It is exclusively in Latvian, so local heads tap into that skateboarding insight. Find out about RajonTV in episode 4, also the recent episode with Edijs Aizstrauts is pretty intriguing. Armands himself was a guest at a podcast recently where he talked about his podcast.
To sum it all up check out this mad edit by Kristofer Ozols. Some clips from Sweden, Riga hijinks and Deda casually destroying his apartment.
Stay strong and keep ot real! See you all soon.
I clearly remember three years ago skating in Gtiims in April and early May because it was always raining. This year April is so hot we are catching tan and fully skating outside filming street clips. It is definitely global warming; however, at least we are going to die after enjoying good weather.
For this month top 10 we finally gathered only street clips from our Baltic friends. Okay, in two clips skaters use some skatepark obstacles, but they skate them in the streets, or end up in the street after skating them (it will be clearer after watching).
If you are convinced your clips must make the cut, please make sure they reach RajonTV. Send a DM or use #rajontop10 and make sure it is filmed outside in the streets not skateparks (at least till next winter).