Skateboarding For Hope Supported By DC Shoes Northern Cape Youth Month Tour: Upington

Following a great stop in Springbok the day prior, the crew made way to Upington for the second stop of the Skateboarding For Hope Supported By DC Shoes Northern Cape Youth Month Tour.

Upington is one of the skate scenes in the Northern Cape that has momentum and is well harnessed. Edwin from the local Department of Sports, Arts, & Culture has recognized the kids’ love of skating and has continued to run skate clinics & competitions and provide the skaters with boards as often as possible to keep the wheels rolling. Thanks for holding it down, Edwin! As was the case last year, the small Upington Skatepark was full for the event and the local skaters and children were stoked to have us back.

We were surprised at how many of the kids already knew how to skate (almost all of them!) We continued to provide skate lessons for those who have never skated and for those who wanted to learn a few new tricks, thanks to our ripping coaches Damian and Warrick. We then handed over the program to Geekulcha, an organization that provides IT/tech training, particularly to the youth. They introduced some coding basics and other techniques and used skateboarding as a way of introcuding the technology. With a generation born into technology, it is important that the children are aware of what is out there and the possibilities that technology can provide. Following Geekulcha’s interesting and educational demo, we moved on to the tricks for cash jam where local skaters put down their best stuff in hopes of coming up on a few bucks. We’re definitely impressed with the progression of the local skaters, it looks like they’ve been putting the park to good use! After handing out some cash and 10 skateboards to needy local skaters, we wrapped things up and called it a day.

Thanks to everyone that made the stop possible: DC Shoes, Northern Cape Tourism, World Skateboarding Federation, Northern Cape Provincial Government, Northern Cape Dept of Sports, Arts, & Culture, and Old School Productions & Pragmatics behind the scenes.

Off to De Aar next to wrap up the tour; stay tuned!

Tricks For Cash Results

Joshua Coghlan – R150 (Flip bs 50-50, Blunt nose grab fakie)
Jeremey Beukes – R150 (5-0 ledge, fakie rock n roll)
Trevor Mokwa – R100 (boardslide)
Liam Dewee – R100 (50-50 ledge)
Flavian Bees – R100 (Boardslide bank to rail)
Herschelle Potgieter – R100 (Fakie FS Heelflip)
Grant Solomons – R100 (Boneless on quarter)
Collin Scholtz – R100 (No comply impossible)
Poere Tities – R100 (50-50 on quarter)

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Spotting this thing upon our way into Upington left us concerned. What is that thing?! Turns out it’s a solar energy tower and not an alien space station as we had suspected.

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