Two days of high flying skateboard action and BMX bike stunts helped to open up the island’s latest purpose built skate park.

The ManXgames took place at Poulsom Park, in Castletown on Saturday and Sunday and saw hundreds head down to the park where a small village of skate shops, merchandise and clothing stall and food trucks sprang up around the new skate bowl, described as a ’world-class’ facility by the event organiser, Jimmy Cubbon.

All over the weekend, kids and adults took to the ramps to demonstrate their prowess on skate boards, BMX bikes and scooters, winning prizes and cheers along the way, accompanied to a soundtrack of local rock bands.

’I started off with a vision of how this weekend might look and it happened exactly as I imagined,’ said Jimmy.

’For a first event, I didn’t expect so many people to support it in the way that they did.

’Everyone got into the spirit of it and, even when we had a bit of rain which delayed things on Saturday, people got stuck in and helped out to get the ramps dry.

’It was brilliant to see.’

Steve Colley officially opened the park, watched by the chief minister Howard Quayle, before showing off his own skills by expertly leaping his bike over the concrete skate ramps and giving a display of stunts and wheelies.

Elsewhere, throughout the day and night, there were local bands, such as the Getaways, Sansoucci, Night Time Tennis, Voodoo Bandits,the Tinkermen, The Mother Funkers and Buncha Skankers, keeping the festival going into the night.

’Mad Daddy brought their fans and other bands brought different people, and it was just a great atmosphere all weekend,’ he said.

’A lot of people didn’t know where the skate park was before this.

Part of the reason was to attract people to the park and show the place off, and it was great to see such a mix of people come over the weekend.

’One of the great things is that one of the parents told me that his daughters were inspired to get into skating, and have booked lessons at the Shred House.

’That’s really what it was all about and hearing things like that and seeing all the kids having a great time skateboarding and riding made all the work worth it. It was very hard to work getting it all together, but it really was worth it in the end.’