Skateboarding

It WAS the lure of the snow that drew Jia Yee to longboard skateboarding almost two years ago. The UCLA biology student loved the feeling of schussing down a mountain on a snowboard -- but she was less enthusiastic about the cost of the winter sport, its seasonal nature and the necessary travel. Longboarding seemed like a good way to get the same rush. With longer decks than their shortboard brethren (usually about 38 inches instead of 30 inches), they are more stable at higher speeds and their softer wheels provide better grip.

The Los Angeles City Council voted Wednesday to seek a speed limit for skateboarders and penalize them for failing to follow a range of traffic rules, from stopping at stop signs to yielding to pedestrians. On a 12 to 0 vote, the council instructed City Atty. Carmen Trutanich to draft an ordinance that would prohibit "unsafe" skateboard activity and limit riders to a speed of 25 mph. The proposal was initiated by Councilman Joe Buscaino, who described it as a response to the death of two skateboarders over the last year.

Mayor Patricia Bates called for a change Thursday in a law that bans skateboarding in the street and criticized as "unwarranted" the arrests of two skateboarding teen-agers who were handcuffed and photographed by sheriff's deputies. "I just feel the action was certainly unwarranted, given the circumstances and age of the children," Bates said, referring to the two 15-year-olds who were arrested last week as they skateboarded along busy Niguel Road.

Still got a skateboard buried somewhere in a corner of the garage? Celebrity personal trainer Mike Donavanik - http://www.mikedfitness.com - suggests you drag it out and repurpose it for this simple and effective fitness move, the skateboard pike. Why you should try it: These assisted pikes work your entire core and build upper body strength. What to do: Place the toes of both feet on the middle of a skateboard placed underneath you. Arms are on the ground in front in a push-up position.

Re "He's Chairman of the Skateboard, So to Speak," July 6. Being a young business major, I found this article to be very interesting and somewhat inspirational. Andre Senizergues has become such a success at such a young age, and you might even say at exactly the right time. The skateboarding, snowboarding and surfing business is on the rise right now. Senizergues not only picked the right business to be involved in but also reveals some of his strategies to create a higher profit for himself.

Bob Biniak, whose daring and innovative skateboarding style as one of the original Dogtown Z-Boys helped revitalize the pursuit in the 1970s, has died. He was 51. Biniak died at Baptist Beaches Medical Center in Jacksonville Beach, Fla., on Feb. 25, four days after having a heart attack, said his wife, Charlene. To his fellow Z-Boys -- a ragtag group from Dogtown, a rough beachfront area wedged between Venice and Santa Monica -- Biniak was simply "the Bullet," a nickname that saluted his affinity for speed.

The beachfront city of Malibu voted Monday to outlaw a form of youthful daredevilry known as speedboarding -- an extreme hobby that has grown increasingly popular here. Speedboarders don protective helmets, knee and elbow pads, and sometimes even sleek bodysuits before hopping onto long skateboards and rocketing down steep public streets and canyon roads at speeds greater than 40 mph. Enthusiasts swear by speedboarding's addictive adrenaline rush.

"Plan for Skateboard Park Moves Ahead," Oct. 9. I just finished reading the article on the proposed Calabasas skateboard park in which skateboarders are characterized as "kids that enjoy risk" who would otherwise be "sitting in front of a TV eating Chee-tos" if it were not for skateboarding. I am fed up with image of skateboarding as a children's sport that is quickly forgotten about at the same time the kid gets his drivers license. I am a 26-year-old college graduate with a good job, a car and my own house.

Professional skateboarding teams from Element, New Deal and Black Label will be featured Saturday at the opening of "The History of Surfing and Skateboarding" exhibit at Creative Spaces in Hollywood. The exhibition, at 6325 Santa Monica Blvd. (one block west of Vine), has an admission of $5 per family. Access to the skateboarding demonstrations, which begin at 10 a.m. and noon only on Saturday, is free. The exhibition will be open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.

The City Council tonight will consider a ban on skateboards in the vicinity of Newport Pier, citing damaged concrete and benches at McFadden Square. Under the ordinance to be proposed at tonight's council meeting, skateboarding would be prohibited on McFadden Place between Balboa Boulevard and the ocean, on the oceanfront between 20th Street and 24th Street, on 21st Place and on the oceanfront parking lot.

Tom Schaar landed a 1080. That's all that needs to be said -- and pretty much all the 12-year-old from Malibu could say immediately after becoming the first skateboarder ever to complete three full rotations in the air and land with his board still underneath him. "I did a 1080!" an out-of-breath and excited Schaar exclaimed into the camera that captured him completing the stunt on only his fifth attempt. Schaar recently became one of only a handful of skaters to land a 900. He set out to nail the 1080 on the MegaRamp at Woodward West in Tehachapi, which was customized by Schaar's sponsor, Red Bull, to feature a 70-foot roll-in ramp that leads to a 50-gap and then a quarterpipe ramp with a 27-foot wall.

Larry Stevenson, a Venice Beach lifeguard who helped popularize skateboarding in the early 1960s by marketing his Makaha boards to riders eager to essentially surf on land, has died. He was 81. Stevenson, who had Parkinson's disease, died Sunday at Santa Monica UCLA Medical Center, said his son, Curt. "He was the guy who said, 'I can merge surfing with the skateboard culture,'" said Michael Brooke, author of the 1999 skateboarding history "The Concrete Wave. " "At one point in time, there was nobody bigger making skateboards.

Dominant online video site YouTube has launched a lineup of sports channels featuring some of the biggest names in action sports — including pro skateboarder Tony Hawk, snowboarder Shaun White and surfer Kelly Slater. The four channels seek to tap into the rising popularity of action sports — especially among teens and twentysomethings — by offering clips, commentary and live events on YouTube. The original content represents another step in the site's efforts to augment its user-created videos with more professionally programmed offerings.

Jacques Heim, the 47-year-old artistic director of the dance company Diavolo, is spending a good chunk of his time lately hanging out with a group of teenage skateboarders. He watches them zoom up and fly off specially designed ramps in his company's warehouse-like space in downtown Los Angeles and, at appropriate moments, tosses them a lot "of random questions," he says. "I'll ask, 'What does fear mean to you?' Or 'Why would you abandon movement in midair?' And I've learned that the word 'commitment' to these kids is as powerful to them as it is to any adult," he says.

James Van Doren and his older brother Paul had only sample sneakers to offer when they opened their first store, in Anaheim, in 1966. They took a dozen orders in the morning and delivered custom canvas deck shoes, made in their adjacent factory, in the afternoon. Operating as the Van Doren Rubber Co., the brothers and two other co-founders planned to succeed by cutting out the middleman and selling their distinctive thick rubber-soled shoes directly to the public. By the early 1970s, the company owed some of its success to Southern California's burgeoning skateboard culture.

So far there have been no dead bodies, no safes stuffed with soggy cash, no rusty stolen cars. The only things exposed by the receding water at Echo Park Lake have been shopping carts, 55-gallon steel barrels, a parking-enforcement "boot" and lots of skateboards. But who knows what is still hidden in the muck at the bottom of the 13-acre lake, soon to be dredged and outfitted with a leak-proof clay liner? Officials say that leaks once required them to replenish the lake with valuable drinking water.

Sighting life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness--which in this case is the freedom to skateboard--a group of youths has formally complained to Hermosa Beach city officials that there is not enough space in the city for land surfers. At last week's City Council meeting, a group of about 10 skateboarders challenged officials to build a skateboard park. The youths said the city built a park for roller hockey and they want a park of their own.

The weather on Venice Beach was typical for a Sunday afternoon in August: The sun was out, there was a slight breeze, the thermometer registered 74 degrees. So, naturally, it was the perfect day for snowboarding. In a patch on the boardwalk amid wandering tourists and crispy beach bums, a snowcapped mountain had been erected out of scaffolding, plywood and massive bricks of ice chipped into a wintry powder. It was built just for the day for the Supergirl Jam, a women's competition in snowboarding, skateboarding and surfing.

When even the skateboarders start commenting on the heat, you know it's hot. But 16-year-old Nyjah Huston survived the temperatures as well as eight runs in two rounds Saturday to claim his first X Games gold medal. "One of the best feelings of my whole life," said Huston, a Northern California native who now resides in Huntington Beach. "Definitely the best win of my career. After getting silver the last two years, when you get gold, it just feels so great. " Huston advanced from an elimination round earlier in the afternoon, and then took to the concrete plaza four times in the finals, all in the glaring sun. "When you get to the end of your run, your legs are definitely giving out," Huston said.