When an Edmonton couple’s four and five-year-old kids began to show an interest in learning to skateboard, they worried how they would be received at an all-ages skatepark. That’s why Ariane Latade and Doran Walker created the VelociRippers Skateboarding Club. They now hope it will encourage other parents in the city to let their young children explore and learn the tricks of the sport. “We started to notice that there wasn’t a large infrastructure around lessons. There had been an indoor space called House of Wheels that shut down around that time too,” Walker explained of the decision to form the club in the spring of last year. “So we wanted to create a space and a community for them and for all the other kiddos in town … to skateboard and to learn.” Admittedly not a pro skateboarder himself, Walker credits coaches the two have onboarded to teach the kids at skateparks around the city every Saturday. Each session is $20. “It’s super hard, super difficult to learn everything. Even the basic stuff is hard. So it helps out that they come, they have that time with the coaches, and then they have their free time after,” he said. He also credits the rest of the skateboarding community who encourage the kids to take reasonable risks. “It’s hard to explain (how it makes me feel), the first time a kid drops in, which is when they stand at the top of one of the ramps, they slam their board and they ride into it for the first time,” Walker said. “It’s just a hype sport. Everyone is cheering, and it’s so exciting the first time they do it.” The next VelociRippers free skate lesson is on June 20. The group is also hosting a competition for younger kids in collaboration with Project Rad, another Edmonton-based youth skateboarding club, on Aug. 8. With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Connor Hogg
