The Early Years of Surfskate at Carving Social Club

When Carving started in Madrid in 2011, surfskating was still quite strange to many people.

For us, it made sense almost from the beginning: we lived far from the sea and were looking for tools that would allow us to continue practicing surf-related movements between one trip and the next.

What started with a few boards ended up becoming a fundamental part of Carving's early years.

When almost no one was talking about Surfskate

In Madrid, it was still uncommon to find groups practicing surf movements on asphalt.

We started trying different boards and systems, organizing meetups, and sharing what we were learning.

Open meetups allowed many people to try different surfskates even before they knew exactly what they were.

Trying many boards taught us more than selling them

Over time, we started working with different brands and systems.

Having access to very different models allowed us to compare how the sensations changed depending on the truck, wheelbase, width, wheels, or setup.

That ended up directly influencing our way of teaching.

It was no longer just about carving. We wanted to understand what we could work on with each tool and how it truly related to surfing.

Classes were the next step

As the number of interested people grew, we started developing classes and our own teaching methodology.

We worked from the first pushes and pumping to movement patterns that we tried to relate to what happens on a wave.

We didn't have the sea in front of us, so repetition became one of our best tools.

Then came the tutorials

A significant part of that work also ended up in video.

We created free tutorials to explain everything from the first steps on a surfskate to movements more related to surf technique.

Many of these contents are still part of our archive, and you can find them in our Surfskate Tutorials.

Everything had to end up in the water

The more we worked away from the sea, the clearer it became that we had to test it in the water.

That's why we started organizing trips where we could connect surfskating and training with real surf sessions.

There, the part that no land-based tool could reproduce appeared: reading the sea, choosing a wave, positioning yourself, and reacting to something that is constantly changing.

Surfskate ended up changing its role

Over the years, Carving moved closer and closer to the sea until establishing its base in El Palmar.

Surfskate ceased to be the center of the project, but it did not disappear.

Today, it continues to be part of our way of working when we want to isolate a movement, repeat it, and then return to the water with a different reference.

If you want to know why we left behind the specialized store, you can read why we stopped selling Surfskates.

A stage that still explains who we are

Those meetups, classes, tutorials, equipment tests, and trips are part of Carving's history.

Not because we want to keep doing exactly the same as back then, but because many of the ideas we learned are still present in how we teach today.

Understanding a movement, trying it, observing it, and trying again is still part of our way of working.

If you want to know the complete journey from Madrid to El Palmar, you can read Our Story.