“Rather Ripped” - the unedited interview
Posted on June 20, 2009.
As you may have guessed by now, our regular 'Favourites' interviews are having a week off, instead we are bringing you the full interview from the 'Rather Ripped' article in the latest issue of the mag, covering the recent all-nighter at The Ripped, Ravensthorpe, as well as highlighting the parks constant struggle to remain open.
Have a read of what Ryan, aka DJ Livewire, from the park has to say now, with scattered video footage from the parks history and photography from the all-nighter by Silent Will.
Daryl Nobbs feels the fresh air on his pivot antics. Photo: Silent
Can you give us a brief history of The Ripped for those that might be unaware of the parks history? When and why it opened, why you chose the location, who was originally involved etc...
The Ripped has been open on and off now for just over two years. It was originally a skatepark called Aggro Verts which ran for over seven years until it fell into such a bad state of repair and lacking of funds that it was eventually forced to shut down in 2005. A couple of month down the line, a group of illegal immigrants broke in and squatted in the place, ripping up the ramps to burn to keep warm through winter until the police found out and stormed the building.
The legend that is Snoz found out that all the remaining wood from inside the building was to be ripped out and the place to be turned into a car garage in about March/April 2006. He went down to ask the landlord if there was any chance he could have the wood or possibly take on the building to start a new skatepark from fresh, which was agreed to. He called up an old mate Simy for a bit of financial backing, then the pair got started on building a brand new, truly unique skatepark, with the help of Sangy, myself and a few others here and there. After about a nine months of solid building, the park held a massive opening jam on the 12th January 2007, with over 160 skaters turning out through the day.
There has been a few changes over the past couple of years, but the park has stayed true to itself and remains one of the most hardcore underground skateparks around, and is run for the love, not the money (even though the money helps!)
Between the park opening and now, how much have things changed?
Since then there has been loads of changes with the park. It's had a few extensions put in, it's changed management a few times, it's had the lead stolen off the roof, it's shut down and re-opened.
We now have a skate shop set up, hold regular skate jams and music events, and to be honest, the place feels like more than just a skatepark now, it feels like home (and not just because I live in t'back room). It's a place where you can come and actually chill out as well as get your shred on. We don't have many rules and we want people to feel free to do what ever they want in the park, within reason. It's got the blood, sweat and tears of myself and a lot of our locals screwed into every surface which makes the place that bit more special and gives it a good community feel which it didn't have when it first opened.
Can you talk us through what is locally referred to as 'The Ripped Disaster' back in 2008 which resulted in the park being almost completely flooded? What exactly happened, how close to closure did it bring you and how did you overcome it?
Argh, 'The Ripped Disaster' - what a shitty time that was! Back in April 2008, just at the start of all the heavy rain fall and most of the country being held under floods, we were starting to feel the effects of the weather with multiple leaks in the park, but then disaster struck when someone decided to steal all the lead off our roof. When I opened the next day I didn't notice anything was wrong until later on when the rain started to pour again. There was literally waterfalls coming in from nearly every area of the roof, it was pouring in faster than I could mop it up. I could see the ramps couldn't take it and I had to make an on the spot decision there and then to shut the place down for the safety of everyone skating and to try preserve some of the wood.
I contacted the landlord straight away to get the buildings insurance involved and get a new roof on as quick as possible so we wouldn't lose too much custom and the business wouldn't be greatly effected, but was shocked when I found out that the money I had been paying to him for buildings insurance he had been putting straight into his pocket, and we didn't even have any insurance. As a result, he had to pay for the new roof out of his own pocket but chose the worst two cowboys in the world to do the job because they were the cheapest. They took all the slates off the roof in a couple of days but left the entire roof with no sort of weather-proof sheeting for about three week, in which time any wood inside that wasn't flooded, now was.
We had to rip up the skin of over 90% of the main section and all of the floor on the top street section. Even the mini bowl got soaked but thankfully didn't warp and has survived. The only ramp that didn't get wet was the micro mini. As the months went on, the funds ran out. Debts started mounting and we still needed to buy a full parks worth of MDF for the re-skin. Lucky for us, I made a few calls and the great man that is Nick Zorlac sorted us out majorly by putting a good word in here and there and securing us a £1000 donation from Relentless, and a van load of free pop which was enough to buy most of the wood to re-skin.
Just as things started looking up for us, disaster struck again when someone broke into the park and stole over £3000 worth of power tools I had borrowed of friends and family to get the place re-skinned. All our drills, saws, nail guns, Playstation with over 100 games, DVDs, stock, everything was gone! I've never been as gutted in my life - how do you repair a park with no tools? Then, to top it off, a few week later, they bust the padlock on the back gate and nicked the tralor we used for getting wood. Stuff really does come in threes!
Things were at an all time low and I couldn't see how we could carry on after all this. If it wasn't for Jamie, Dave and Eamon helping out like they did, and a big bag of white widow, I probably wouldn't have found that last push of energy needed to go back out, borrow more money, get more drills and just crack on. I got the 24th of August in my head for the re-opening, and we worked solid 'til nearly 4am every night for the last few weeks to get the place ready. It took 5 month because of the idiots putting the new roof on, but we finally got there.
The Ripped - 2007:
More Skateboarding >>
Other than that, how many times have you seriously thought you were going to have to close The Ripped?
The first time was when Snoz left. He had damaged his foot in a surfing accident and the doctors told him not to skate or surf again, and I think with him been stuck in the park all the time not been able to skate, things got a bit on top and he needed to get away. As Simy was a 50% partner in the park, Snoz was going to sell him his half so he could buy a camper van and set off into the distance. Simy agreed but as he had another full time business he couldn't keep the ripped open unless someone took over management for pretty much no pay at all. Because I had left my normal job to help them anyway and loved the place, I proper wanted to help keep it open so decided I would jump in and run it everyday with the help of Jamie, who also helped build parts of the park. As a result it stayed open.
The second time, Simy had grown tired of the place, there was no profit coming out of it as we just scraped through the bills month to month, and his other business started doing really well. He wanted to sell the park on but no one was interested, so he was just going to shut it down. After a couple of months of me blagging his head that if he shut it down someone would turn it into a garage and it would never be a skatepark again, and he wouldn't be losing anything by just handing me the keys, he finally agreed to let me have the skatepark in February 2008. As a result, we saved it from closing again. The third time was the disaster period.
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