So long, Officer!

Red Bull Access All Areas is a license to skate. Skaters are given free reign of unusual locations for an entire day. Unchallenged by security guards (who are, as far as skateboards are concerned, the axis of evil), skaters can throw down tricks in places that would normally lead to some trouble: museums, airports, and even freeways! The latest events took place at the University of Vienna (Austria) and at the Phaeno Science Center in Wolfsburg (Germany).

To be a thoroughbred skater, not only do you need to be agile, you also need to have a vivid imagination. Turning university desks into curbs, subway stairs into gaps and entire city districts into skateparks is no easy task!

Red Bull Access All Areas transforms dreary theory into out-and-out action: during the series of events, selected skaters are, for a short time, given access to locations where no man has boldly skated before. Such as motorways and the roofs of buildings, public buildings and churches - without a security guard in sight.

Ollies in the lecture theatre

This year the series was kicked off by events in Germany and Austria. Nine skaters, including vert specialist Jürgen Horrwarth, started things off by strutting their stuff at the futuristic Phaeno Science Center in Wolfsburg. Tricks included ollies and frontside 50-50s over rail. Then Mac McKelton and his crew set about transforming the University of Vienna into a skater's paradise.

Where Viktor Frankl, Pope Pius III and Sigmund Freud once studied, the skaters made a few new discoveries of their own. For example, what it's like to jump the eleven steps in the main entrance hall on a skateboard.

Series of events runs through to late autumn

Following the events in Germany and Austria, this year will see Red Bull Access All Areas take place in numerous other locations throughout Europe and South America - next up are Bratislava, Trnava and Kosice (Slovakia), Prague (Czech Republic), then Bogota (Columbia), Greece and Switzerland in late summer and then Venezuela, Italy and Spain in the autumn.

Suggestions for other attractive locations which, under normal circumstances, would be completely off-limits, can be posted on the official website at www.redbullaccessallareas.com