We hope you will recall how, when we reported on Skateboard GB’s 2026 Park Nationals back in July, we promised to do likewise come September for their Street Nationals, which just took place last weekend.
Well, word is bond amigos- and so Sunday just passed saw us all once again come together in the venerable Bay66 skatepark just off bustling Ladbroke Grove in West London for the third edition of the UK Street Champs to be held in the capital.
Ph: Hazel Whitehouse
That whole neighbourhood has benefitted from investment over the last decade- it could once have charitably been described as positively insalubrious- and Bay66 has moved with those times.
I’m sure it has been remarked upon before, but it is good to see how the management there have professionalised their whole operation and invested sponsorship money in creating a skatepark worthy of hosting both national and international events.
Ph: Hazel Whitehouse
That tipping of the hat should also go to all the Skateboarding GB staff who struck a perfect balance between running an efficient event and rolling over to have a word with newbies for skating unused corners of the course during people’s runs. All handled skater to skater, as it should be.
Ph: Hazel Whitehouse
Looking around the busy park during finals, it is hard not to reflect on the fact that it is not just the space itself which has evolved; clearly, so has the British skateboarding scene.
Having been to innumerable demo’s, jams and heaven-knows-what-else there down the years, you can’t help but notice that the crowd there on Sunday just looked different: more diverse, for one thing. More parents, certainly- but also more women, generally.
Put it like this: during one lull in the action, a baby stroller made its way along the edge of the course. That didn’t happen at Night Of The Living Dead. Sign of the times, we might suppose.
Ph: Hazel Whitehouse
But perhaps most importantly: there were a lot of early-teenaged skaters there.If you follow skateboarding generationally, you will know that demographic right now is what we need, and proportionally you seem to see more of them at Skateboard GB events than anywhere else of which I am aware in the UK today. That, surely, is a direction of travel to support.
Ph: Ryan Bradley
Half the podium spots went to new faces since last year: while the unrinsable Joe Hinson and bass-shredding ATV Miriam Nelson deservedly retained their crowns- Joe, notably for the sixth time- big James White took the third place spot in Men’s- which Joshua Mayson claimed last year- behind Alex Decunha, while it was all change below Miriam as Lona Gordon and Yuki Takahashi-McGilvray took the second and third places (previously held by Phoebe Mottram and Sophie Ellis) in Women’s respectively.
Ph: Ryan Bradley
As always with these things, though, the podiums are only ever part of the story. The fact that this facet of British skateboard culture is returning continually to put on event after event where anyone can enter is a good news story reflected in the make-up of the crowd attending. There is no need to fit in or be down. Just ask Nathan Clancy, who cut his teeth here in years previous before being spotted by Polar.
Ph: Ryan Bradley
With over forty entrants cheered along by five hundred spectators over the course of the weekend, including a sold-out Sunday, and ten thousand of your finest English pounds in prize money dished out, this was another triumphant exercise in skateboarding as part of the wider community.
Ph: Hazel Whitehouse
Passers-by stopped to peer through the grilles along the Acklam Road walkway which runs parallel to the park; just another jigsaw piece of a safe, bohemian Sunday in West London as early autumn descends once again.
A sign of the times, perhaps- but a lovely thing to be a part of, certainly.
Men’s Street Results
- Joe Hinson
- Alex Decunha
- James White
Women’s Street Results
- Miriam Nelson
- Lona Gordon
- Yuki Takahashi-McGilvray