Lone NZ skateboarder rolls across three continents
07 Oct 2008
Kiwi skateboarder Rob Thomson has completed an epic solo skateboard journey through three continents that began in Switzerland and finished in Shanghai.
After 462 days and 12,000km on his trusty ‘longboard’ wheels, Thomson rolled into Shanghai’s People’s Square on Saturday (4 October). There was no welcoming party for the lone traveller but he managed to persuade a local man to take his photo marking the moment.
The journey had taken the 28-year-old Canterbury University arts graduate, from the South Island city of Christchurch, across Europe, North America, and China.
Guinness World Record
Thomson, who hopes to have the feat recognised by Guinness World Records, said he was motivated by wanting to push himself outside his comfort zone.
"I took a couple of years of my life to put myself outside of my comfort zone," he told National Radio.
"The thing that kept me going was a pure commitment to finishing what I had started. I said I would skateboard across China. By hook or by crook I was going to do it."
Unaided and self-sufficient
Thomson said other long distance skateboarding feats had involved support teams and he had wanted to do his unaided, carrying his own gear and being self-sufficient.
He said the scariest moment was in Texas when he was almost struck down by a fast truck carrying a house.
"It must have missed my by about 10 or 20cm," he said. "I was just left thinking, if that had been a foot closer to me, I would have been gone and what a terrible way to go."
Skateboarding novice
Though Thomson was a newcomer to skateboarding when he set off on his journey, he was already a long-distance veteran - having first arrived in Switzerland from Asia on his recumbent bicycle.
He initially set out to skateboard across the United States but half-way through - "somewhere in Texas, I believe" - the thought of finishing his journey on the US west coast felt a little too soon.
"I still have a little more push in me I thought. I considered a few options before settling on travelling back to China to complete 'unfinished business' by skateboarding the section that I had taken a train across at the very beginning of the journey."
When Thomson arrives back in New Zealand, he’s planning to hop back on his bike to cycle the 700km from Auckland to his home-town of Christchurch as a warm down to his world first skateboarding journey.
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