Ryan Robinson - Spono'd for the day - Chocolate Review
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Never in my life have I read a deck review, let alone written one, so you can imagine my apprehension when Stefan asked me to put pen to paper. But, like any thrifty skateboarder, the prospect of free product that I most definitely did not need, pushed me into it.
From the outset, I was thinking about how you even write something like this with it making sense, rather than seeing something like this posted up online:
Chocolate Vincent Alvarez Original Chunk V2 Skateboard Deck Features:
- Original Chunk V2 Deck
- 8.25'' x 31.875''
- 14'' WB
- 7-Ply Canadian Maple
- Vincent Alvarez Pro Model
- OG Chunk V2 Series
What in the name of Spike Jonze does that even mean?! I’m sure no one knows and it’s all just some mental marketing ploy to make all boards seem ‘different ’and ‘unique’, so strap yourself in and let me be brutally honest.
It’s 9:23 am and Liam from DPD has nearly smashed my f**cking door down with his iron fist, cheers pal… But the package is here and like a kid, at Christmas I cracked it open within seconds. It’s a Chocolate deck.
I’m not going to lie to you, my first thought was “great, now everyone at the skatepark is going to laugh at me”. I haven’t ridden a Chocolate deck since I was about 12 when I was pressured into it by some old heads at the skateshop. Anyway, placing my personal biases aside - I went ahead with my business.
My first thought, it’s a little skinnier than I'm used to, but it feels light and it looks like a real nice shape. I’ve always been a stickler for Deluxe wood, I like the concave. And I can honestly say, after a little roll around - it feels identical. I’m happy.
I can’t argue with the pop either, I can’t lie there were moments in my solitary isolation skate that I genuinely felt a little bit Gino (it’s more than likely that was the sun and the lack of water).
After a week solid of skating gritty car parks, falling off trying to skate switch and slamming my nose into various assortments of curbs. I’d lost no pop, there were no chips, the board still felt like it’d just come out of the box, and I’d reinvested a long lost love for skating street. And that’s when it dawned on me… I was wrong and I’ve never been happier to admit it. Sometimes the classics are classics for a reason, in my eyes, this rang true with this Chocolate deck.
TLDR:
- DPD Drivers knock well too aggressively
- I’m an idiot and I was wrong
- Chocolate boards are well worth the £55
- The quality and durability of this deck is unreal, if it can hold my fat ass for weeks on end with little to no damage, you’ll be fine.
- Buy a Chocolate board and channel your inner Vincent Alvarez.
