2019 has been a great year for Team Pain. We had the opportunity to design and build a beautiful, new 16,000 sq ft skatepark in the city of Lexington, North Carolina among many other projects. Our crew had an awesome time in North Carolina and enjoyed skating the park each day after work. The timeline of work in Lexington left a gap between Team Pain leaving the site and all of the landscaping, lighting, grass, and parking lot being finished. Our crew was itching to skate the park completed. We decided we had to take a trip from Florida back to the new park with our crew once everything was finished. We run a web segment called “first tube”, where we offer the world a first glimpse of our newest projects. It is important and exciting to us to show the world how great these parks are when they are finished. So, we rented a van, called the guys, and hit the road to make the most out of five days away from home.
We hit the road early in the morning for a 9 hour drive to Lexington from Orlando. 9 straight hours of laughter was not something anyone complained about. A whole day in the van was enough to wear anyone out. So, we got our hotel room and went to bed early so we could hit the new park in the morning. In the a.m. we grabbed food and got to the park. Everything is brand new so we knew the session would be exciting.. We met up with Tony from EQNX skateboards and Nate Stout to help us film and shoot photos. Our crew consists of extremely well rounded skaters. Not just a few, all of them. Everyone working for our crew is a lifetime skater. We had Team Pain jobsite foreman, Curt Baker blasting foot plants and inverts in the bowl while Deein Coats and Chris Roque were putting some serious work into our quality control on the street course and brick quarter in the back. We had a small crew of Lexington locals show up to enjoy and preview the park with us. The day really started out as a mystery. The first time at a new park is always interesting, we spent the day finding the best lines and all of the spots in the park that flow together. After six hours in the sun, as you can imagine, we were beat. Regrouping at our hotel happened and after some food we decided to bomb some hills and go street spot hunting in the Lexington area. As you can see from the photos and videos, Tyler Blair can ollie higher than he should be able to. Tyler shut down more than a few spots in the afternoon along with having to bail out of some speed wobbles on a hill bomb going 30+ miles per hour.
The sun went down but that didn’t stop us from having a good ol time. Classic rock legend Ted Nugent played a free show for a few thousand people just across the highway from the hotel. We went and caught some “cat scratch fever” and “stranglehold” and got out of there before a sea of MAGA hats swept the area.
For the second day in Lexington we played it safe and decided to get to the park in the afternoon rather than get baked in the sun all day. NC local Jevans and Piff brought us to some wild street set ups after breakfast. Turns out, everyone that came on the trip likes a good street spot. We were, surprisingly, not bothered by anyone while street skating… Wish is was more like this back in Florida. We made the decision after lunch to get to the park and finish filming for the “first tube” section.
By waiting til midafternoon to visit the park we learned quite a few things. First, mid afternoon pushes the sun behind some really tall trees at the Lexington park. This provides a ton of shade and blocks that late afternoon sunlight that tends to blind everyone. Showing up a little later in the day proved to be a cooler option. Secondly, as the sun began to set we were surprised with LIGHTS!! We were on site for the first evening of lights at the park. As you can see from the photos, the park looks amazing at night. The park is extremely visible at night.
Sunday, the day of rest. Or so they say. We woke up looking like a group of guys that needed a serious amount of rest. We knew we had a long road home but decided to go out of our way to check out the beautiful Apex, NC park. Team Pain completed the 18,000 sq. ft. park in Apex back in the summer of 2015. This park still looks brand new. Apex park was surrounded by a beautiful area and a giant water tower that stands facing the park, almost as a mascot. Other than this visit to apex being, without a doubt, the hottest part of the trip we skated as long as our bodies would allow us. After thanking the Apex locals and changing into some dry clothes we crawled back into the van and told 9 hours of jokes til we hit Central Florida once again.
This was supposed to be a quick trip back to Lexington to obtain content for our site and boost visitors to the new park after the grand opening but ended up being way more. We are excited to release this First Tube video so you can all see how great this new park is. The ribbon cutting has already happened, this park is open to the public as we speak. However, on October 19th, there will be a grand opening celebration. We will be back to chat with everyone and give away tons of goodies to everyone! Please come say hello and catch some shade under our tent!
-James Covington
