This past weekend, Osiris team riders, Corey Duffel, James Brockman, Clint Peterson, John Rattray, Stu Graham and flow rider, Tom “Grom” Remilard hit the open road, destination, Arizona. The plan was to brave the 100+ degree, stale, dry heat, do some instore signings, evening demos and night time filming missions for our upcoming video, Feed The Need. We were warned that it was the beginning of monsoon season, and that we should expect rainstorms every night. Although it did rain a little bit over the course of the weekend, the heat was our biggest obstacle. Most days were spent poolside, or watching TV in the hotel room. Russell taught Clint a few elementary Photoshop skills, and the result was all of our heads being arranged on objects ranging from obese babies, to lizards. Once the sun fell Friday night, we made it over to the Gilbert Park for a demo and the first annual 5th Street Rollers “High Ollie Challenge”. The turnout was great, the demo was fun, and although Corey was not registered, he definitely had the highest ollie around. Thanks to Jeremy from 5th Street Rollers and his staff for showing us a good time. Following the demo, we hooked up with the Skateboard Mag’s Matt Price along with Osiris flow rider, and all around awesome dude, Aaron “Jaws” Homoki.

Jaws came alive on this trip and treated us to handrail attacks as well as pool shredding. Great to see you Jaws, you’re a classic guy to have on every session. Saturday night we had a signing at Utility followed by a demo at the Tempe Park. Tempe had a lot of local skaters on hand, and all of the Osiris team was shredding the park and having fun with kids. The rains came about mid way through the demo, but everyone skated until the course got too slippery, and then took a break to enjoy some pizza. Thanks Bob for providing the food and drinks, we had a lot of fun. Later that night we went to a bar, where our old friend and all around ripper, Andrew Cannon hosted Saturday night karaoke. We all took a crack at singing some tunes, but in this case, the locals blew our crew out of the water. One man in particular, let’s just call him “The Dude” due to his striking resemblance to Jeff Lebowski, knew what he was doing on the mic, but was actually Andrew Cannon who stole the show! Well done, Andrew, it’s always a pleasure hanging out and skating with you. The following day we had a signing and demo for Industrial Ride Shop at the Peoria Park followed by a shoe clinic at an arcade and restaurant known as Jillian’s.

The demo had a huge turn out, and the guys were enjoying the incredible park. Most of the skate action was taking place in the pool towards the back of the park where onlookers witnessed Stu, Tom Grom and Jaws ripping that thing to shreds. After the demo, we met up with Doug Butcher from Industrial and his regional store managers to preview the Osiris Holiday line, have some dinner and play games. Everyone had a lot of fun challenging each other to air hockey, pool, basketball, and video games until we had our fill. We then set out to do some late night street skating that had the crew out and about until 6:30am before calling it a night. These AZ summers are ruthless, so behaving like a nocturnal creature becomes pretty standard. All in the entire trip was a success. Everyone had a good time skating, shard some laughs, and surprisingly, no one fainted from heat stroke. Special thanks to Tom Wilson, Mark Voigt, Chris Brown, Doug Butcher and the Industrial Staff, Bob at Utility, Jeremy at 5th Street Rollers and all of the skaters for coming out to skate and show us a good time. See you all again once the temperature drops!
Feed The Need,
Mike Fitz

3rd Lair Skatepark took up residence in a small warehouse in a somewhat sketchy area of South Minneapolis, Minnesota, in the fall of 1996. Prior to 3rd Lair, said warehouse had housed one of the first indoor skateparks in the Twincities area, The Skate Oasis. After the Oasis closed its doors, the space later became Canaan Skatepark. After a short stint as a car dealership, the warehouse was transformed into the third skatepark in the same building, hence the name, 3rd Lair.

As the neighborhood progressed into a more hospitable place for suburban moms and kids alike, the skatepark grew into a shop as well, and hosted a slew of demos, including the likes of Toy Machine and Zero, Girl and Chocolate, as well as the Tony Hawk Gigantic Skatepark Tour. After a slight change of ownership, it was decided that 3rd Lair needed a larger and more flexible space to grow into, hence a warehouse five minutes outside of Downtown Minneapolis was found.

In the fall of 2002, 3rd Lair re-opened in Golden Valley, Minnesota. Old locals made the move along with the park, and in it’s ever more hospitable locale the park found a new set of locals as well. The new building also meant a renewed focus on the shop side of things, and the name of the business was quickly updated to 3rd Lair Skatepark and Skateshop. Now, not only does 3rd Lair continue to host the best demos and contests in town, it has grown into one of the premier skater owned shops in the state of Minnesota. As of 2007, 3rd Lair is stronger than ever boasting more skateable space than ever, and more product than ever in order to keep the Twincities skating population as happy as ever.

3rd Lair SkatePark & SkateShop
850 Florida Ave. South
Golden Valley, Mn. 55426
Phone: 763-797-5283

A few years back my friend Brad and I had an idea. I would move back to Ohio, and he and I would start a skate shop just outside of Cleveland. The shop was going to be called Joy/Pain, but before any concrete plans were made, life got in the way. For reasons I can’t remember, I never moved to back to Ohio, and Brad decided to focus on his family and open up a pizza shop. That was years ago, and since then many things have changed, but one thing that never changed was Brad’s dream of opening a skate shop. Late last year Brad opened up a shop with the support of his wife, and Fable Skateboards was born. Located in historic Oberlin, Ohio, Oberlin is the home of many stops of the Underground Railroad, one of the nations leading liberal arts colleges, and now Fable Skateboards.

Any meaning behind the name Fable? By definition fable means a story that teaches a lesson, and we feel that has a lot to do with skateboarding.

Is the little drawing on your shop tees and boards supposed to look like the pirate version of Humpty Dumpty? No, I guess we just got lucky. We hope in the future to incorporate other artists to do their rendition of the pirate along with doing a few of their own designs for t-shirts.

Is it true you offered a free pizza with the purchase of a deck? Yes, this year we started a program with East of Chicago Pizza where anyone who buys a board receives a free medium pizza.

Fable Skateboards carries: Osiris, Adio, Dvs, I-path, Lakai, Supra, Alien Workshop/Habitat, Blueprint, Bueno, Consolidated, Element, Traffic, Zero/Mystery, Darkroom, Krew, Planet Earth, The Quiet Life, and Nixon

Fable Skateboards
88 South Main St.
Oberlin, Oh 44074
440-774-2020

Fable Skateboards and Osiris flow rider Joe Zapotechne, BS Flip. Photo: B. Smitty