Four months of intense building (no sir, no shotcrete!) were needed to build the first skatepark with the biggest bowl in Perú and in the whole subcontinent, except Brazil. The skatepark was ready to be named: Converse Skatepark, 100% financed by the big company, and ready to be inaugurated: the company wanted things to be done the big way, inviting three of its international riders – Rune Glifberg, Mike Anderson and Renato Souza.
Some things make sense when you’re far from home. Live in Peru and maybe you’ll understand why there is so much pressure on building skate parks. With lots of young people and Lima being a giant monster city, they have a great need for infrastructures. Big companies invest here because of the crisis in Europe and in the USA while the economy in Peru is on the rise. And why are the skaters so stoked? Brazil is the model!
We – the Doctor Skatepark construction team – were also totally stoked by the success of the park. Pedro Barros invited himself after I showed his father pictures of the bowl, and he came along with Vi Kakinho – one of the to-be-looked-at rising figures in his country – and with a Lima-Florianopolis invitation plane ticket to the RTMF bowl contest for the best Peruvian.
On the D-day, everyone was there: the builders (we had three of the team in the bowl finals: Ricardo Quicaño, Ángelo Mitma, and Tito Quicaño – who won the plane ticket!), the promoters (Converse Peruvian team, representatives of the company, and the international team), the municipality representatives, the media (a huge press campaign was organized) and Lima’s have-to-be-there of the skateboarding scene, and the public.
The contest was invitational: under 12, amateurs and pros in street, and open bowl. Not the most interesting event of the year, if it wasn’t for the fact that the street course is unusual regarding the country’s standards, and the skaters – and the judges! – didn’t really know how to handle small trannies, a tight wallride and a small but well furnished street course… The bowl contest felt somehow the same way: a bowl of that size was totally new to many, except the ones that traveled to Brazil, but even for them, there was really little time to practice and get used to it or find good lines. Thus the contest was marked by the presence of Vi Kakinho with high airs and fast lines.
The demo felt like the best continuation of the bowl finals: growing energy and adrenaline were focused by Rune Glifberg and the unplanned presence of Pedro Barros. Both of them flew as high as the audience could dream of, gave the giant bowl all its meaning, and the locals a great opportunity to enter a huge session. During the next days, the pictures and videos grew on the internet and facebook like a local buzz, everyone being stoked for what awaits the future generations of Peruvian skaters… Come and check the scene in the coming years! – Pierre Jambé / doctorskatepark.com
For the article about the Construction of the park, check it out here:
https://www.confuzine.com/2012/11/23/mummy-discovered-beneath-new-skatepark-lima-peru/
For more on this project by Doctor Skatepark, check out:
http://pierrejb.agora.eu.org/doctorskatepark/index.php/es/joomla-fr/doctor-skatepark-accueil-es/proyectos/111-skatepark-converse-san-borja-lima-pe-es
Muchas gracias to Peru’s slideskateboarding.net for additional photos as well as independent photographers Deivid Tellez, Gonzalo Noriega, Elsma Ramirez, Don Barger and Freddy Sinarahua Apuela.
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