On inventing new sports

On inventing new sports

Comedian and tennis enthusiast Tony Hawks has made a bit of a career out of the fact that he is not skateboarder and extreme sports enthusiast Tony Hawk. In fact, there is a very excellent section on his website, heaving under the weight of misdirected emails from confused sk8trboiz and grrls asking an English comedian tips on doing an "Ollie", whatever that means.

His tennis career having peaked in the thrashing of the entire Moldovan football side several years ago, Hawks must be aware that the sport suffers one hell of an image problem when it comes to the hip young kids on the street.

And Hawk must be well aware, as time's icy grip sweeps over his 42-year-old shoulders, that the knees aren't going to hold out forever and his scheme of brining skateboarding to the English middle classes may never be realised.

That is, until now. Instead of working against each other, why not work together? The results would be awesome.

Dear Tony Hawks,

Congratulations on getting round Ireland with a fridge. I hope your plan to circumnavigate Argentina with a tumble dryer meets with similar success.

Look, I've had a spunker on a idea that's going to make you millions, so you don't have to do those Radio Four panel shows ever again. It's a bit controversial, but here goes:

You've got to bury the hatchet with your arch-nemesis Tony Hawk and combine forces. With growing numbers of people assuming that Total Wipeout is a genuine sport that's going to be in the 2012 Olympics, you've both got to do something to bring proper, genuine sports to the masses.

Skateboard tennis: The perfect combination of dude and toff. The kind of sport that idiot TV executives will pay a fortune for the rights because of the fair-to-middling chance that somebody may lose actual limbs.

Imagine, if you will, Scottish loser Andy Murray, roaring down a half-pipe at Henman Hill, performing a perfect 1080 before hitting a perfect backhand winner past a surprised teenager wearing a bandana. The best of British, I'm sure you'll agree.

Then he'd lose to some eight-year-old from Samoa in the next round.

Stephen Hawking's up for the Paralympic version. And if you can get Serena Williams and her brother on board, it'll be unstoppable.

You pal

Albert O'Balsam

and...

Dear Tony Hawk

Yo! Dude! Like, gnarly!

Your pal

Albert O'Balsam

This time next year, etc...