Just finished volunteering at Giants Head Freeride, and man do I love this event and the longboard community! When you volunteer, you only have to work half the event, and then get to skate the other half. Top that off with the fact that they feed you, and give you free stuff like wheels and swag from the sponsors.

They had me doing corner marshalling, which is where you watch to see if anyone gets hurt, then determine if they’re ok, or if we need to close course to get an ambulance up the hill! Luckily I got to watch some pretty great corners, so I got a decent amount of footage of people skating, and some crashing as well! Thankfully I don’t think anyone got seriously injured, and I think the worst I heard about was a dislocated shoulder. Which considering how crazy Giants Head mountain is, and how many people all skate together in packs, it’s actually pretty amazing we don’t see more people getting hurt, but that’s I guess what they hay bales and ambulance are there for just in case!

Another favourite part of the event is just running into all the friends from all over the world that I’ve made at these events over the years, and getting to skate with them again! I even had some friends come out from back in my home province of Manitoba, where I ran the longboard community. The fact that I watched many of these guys grow up, and develop their longboarding skills, made it especially rewarding to get to skate this epic hill with them.

While at the event I had the opportunity to talk to many company leaders, well respected community members, and talk to them about what SkateHive and Gnars DAO have been working on. Based on those conversations I think I’m going to work on some proposals to get some funds to sponsor many of the longboard events, and races. Aside from just being good marketing, it’s also going to show them that what I’ve been telling them is true. Kinda putting my money where my mouth is!

Another method I might try to employ, will be to post on behalf of things like events, skate shops, and even sponsored riders if they really need the help. I figure this will help with bringing a lot of content over to SkatwHive, and then when other longboarders join they will have lots of content to keep them engaged.

The last idea I came up with from these conversations, was to make a proposal to make a longboard event, and make the event free by covering the costs. Then bring a photographer, as well as tell everyone to bring GoPros to film themselves with, and then post all of that on SkateHive and That’s Gnarly to monetize the content. This will then fund the next event, and allow everyone to continue to attend for free. This of course really depends on how much it’ll cost to actually throw a quality event, but at the least I think we can use the content to make future events far more affordable for everyone. This in turn allows more people to attend events, which brings in new skaters, which grows the sport, and gives us even greater exposure as result.

After that event I’m sore and tired, but I’m full of stoke. Now I’m looking forward to getting back to my boat, and sleeping for an entire day! Then I’ve got to repair my boat engine, and then hopefully I’ll have the time to go through all the incredible footage I got at the event, and make an edit. Perhaps I’ll be able to maybe get a few clips out to tease everyone, but I got a lot of footage to go through.

• Vote for @skatehive witness
• Delegate HP to @skatehive
• Follow our curation trail
• Buy a Skatehive OG NFT : Buy here
• Test and FeedBack on Skatehive.app