RIYADH: June 21 marked Go Skate Day. Skateboarders worldwide celebrate the day by participating in the sport they love.
Go Skate Day is an annual promotional event organized by the International Association of Skateboard Companies to help make skateboarding more accessible through events held in cities around the world.
Sandlifers is a skateboarding community in Riyadh consisting of 11 members. They commemorated the occasion by hosting an event at Alnakhel Skatepark, where they distributed prizes to the winners of their challenges.
“Skateboarding day is a day where everybody around the world skates, even people who don’t skate, they skate today, and we created challenges for skaters in today’s event,” said Shareef Masarani, a member of Sandlifers, told Arab News.
“They do tricks, and the other person has to do the trick, and we will choose winners or do a certain obstacle, and they win a prize. In addition, we bring food and show support to the community and help kids who want to learn the game,” he said.
Masarani, 35, started skateboarding when he was 15 and continued until the age of 18. He then stopped skateboarding but has resumed his passion over the past year and a half.
“I work as a chef, but skating is my passion, and I love what I do, so we started this skater community in 2020, and it overgrew.”
Masarani believes that having such a society in the Kingdom is necessary because the Olympics recognize the sport and the energy people put into it.
“Skateboarding has been part of the Olympics since last year. The Saudi Sports Federation recognized that, and they’re also throwing an actual competition in a few months, and the prizes are huge,” Masarani said.
Masarani sees a future for the sport in the Kingdom — the number that showed up for this year’s event had increased significantly from last year’s audience.
“We need to make this sport more popular and reach more people, but it is growing fast from what I’ve seen from last year to now. This park was not this full and the level has grown so much,” Masarani said.
Sultana Alshareef, a 10-year-old skater who has been skating since she was seven years old, took first place in the competition.
“I love this game and my coach, Shareef, taught me a lot of stuff in this game, and hopefully one day I will join the Saudi Olympics as a professional,” Alshareef said.
Reef Hassan, a 14-year-old skater who participated in the competition, has been practicing for a year and a half.
“I came in second place in today’s competition, and the prizes were skateboards, which makes participating in these competitions fun, and I really enjoy the game and want to get better at it,” she said.
Maddie, 21, has been skating for four months and hopes to see more public places available for the sport.
“As a female, I want to support other females playing the game. When they see me skate, they get excited and want to roll in, but I want to see more free and public places where we can practice the game. If they build more skate parks, I am sure more girls will pick it up,” Maddie said.
The companies sponsoring the event are Saudi ones: Exwings, an extreme sports club, and Locosonix, a skate shop.
Visit the Sandlifers community’s Instagram page for more information @sandlifers.