PHOTO GALLERY: Urban sport brings young men together like family

Paul Marin floats, just inches above unforgiving pavement, with nothing more than thin plywood and some rickety wheels between his fluid form and certain pain.

As he approaches a curb, a step, a rail, any angle or impediment, his hips and knees guide his skateboard like any artist guides a brush. There's no time for hesitation.

“Like good photography or a good song, it's your expression,” Marin, 23, said. “Someone may be able to pick up the same trick it took you weeks to learn, but you don't care, because you aren't doing it for anyone else.”

As teens, Marin and some of his skating friends jokingly have dubbed themselves the “Mobbed Mafia.” (In skating, a mobbed trick is one that was poorly executed.)

“We met skating about six years ago,” Joe Bonen, 23, said. “We'd see each other around, and after a while we started filming.”

Every day (weather permitting), these skate-mafiosos would hit the streets, bringing a video camera in tow, looking for new tricks and new feats to master. Later, they'd post their videos on YouTube.

Friendships deepened, and the mafia grew.

Marin didn't start skateboarding until he was 13. He grew up on the northern shore of Puerto Rico, in a town called Dorado, surrounded by beaches and mountains and 80-degree winter days.

Then he, his little brother and little sister came to Cedar Rapids with their mom in 2000. It was difficult leaving Puerto Rico behind.

“I went from one extreme to the next,” Marin said. “I went from having a huge family to no family at all almost, the beach for snow and winter. ... I'd always seen snow, but I didn't really understand it until I was here.”

Although Puerto Rico had a large skateboarding and surfing scene, Marin hadn't really skated until he came to Iowa. His skateboard was a way to reconnect with home, while helping him connect to his new home in Cedar Rapids.

As a teenager hopping curbs and strafing benches, it didn't take long before Marin found some friends with a mutual love of taking spills and ducking cops.

They found other common ground, too. Bonen was born in Okinawa, Japan, and also moved to Cedar Rapids when he was 13.

Skater Nick Patrick, 23, says a shared love of the craft brought them together, but after awhile, “the guy skating next to you” is reason enough. Over time, they became like family.

“We argue all the time. We get crabby,” Patrick says, ‘but we always find each other and we always end up skating.”

Six years and hours upon hours of tricks and videotape later, the Mobbed Mafia is still skating.

“We can't get out like we used to. We're not in high school. There's the real world,” Bonen said. “It's been difficult, but skating keeps us together.”

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Paul Marin floats, just inches above unforgiving pavement, with nothing more than thin plywood and some rickety wheels between his fluid form and certain pain.

As he approaches a curb, a step, a rail, any angle or impediment, his hips and knees guide his skateboard like any artist guides a brush. There's no time for hesitation.

“Like good photography or a good song, it's your expression,” Marin, 23, said. “Someone may be able to pick up the same trick it took you weeks to learn, but you don't care, because you aren't doing it for anyone else.”

As teens, Marin and some of his skating friends jokingly have dubbed themselves the “Mobbed Mafia.” (In skating, a mobbed trick is one that was poorly executed.)

“We met skating about six years ago,” Joe Bonen, 23, said. “We'd see each other around, and after a while we started filming.”

Every day (weather permitting), these skate-mafiosos would hit the streets, bringing a video camera in tow, looking for new tricks and new feats to master. Later, they'd post their videos on YouTube.

Friendships deepened, and the mafia grew.

Marin didn't start skateboarding until he was 13. He grew up on the northern shore of Puerto Rico, in a town called Dorado, surrounded by beaches and mountains and 80-degree winter days.

Then he, his little brother and little sister came to Cedar Rapids with their mom in 2000. It was difficult leaving Puerto Rico behind.

“I went from one extreme to the next,” Marin said. “I went from having a huge family to no family at all almost, the beach for snow and winter. ... I'd always seen snow, but I didn't really understand it until I was here.”

Although Puerto Rico had a large skateboarding and surfing scene, Marin hadn't really skated until he came to Iowa. His skateboard was a way to reconnect with home, while helping him connect to his new home in Cedar Rapids.

As a teenager hopping curbs and strafing benches, it didn't take long before Marin found some friends with a mutual love of taking spills and ducking cops.

They found other common ground, too. Bonen was born in Okinawa, Japan, and also moved to Cedar Rapids when he was 13.

Skater Nick Patrick, 23, says a shared love of the craft brought them together, but after awhile, “the guy skating next to you” is reason enough. Over time, they became like family.

“We argue all the time. We get crabby,” Patrick says, ‘but we always find each other and we always end up skating.”

Six years and hours upon hours of tricks and videotape later, the Mobbed Mafia is still skating.

“We can't get out like we used to. We're not in high school. There's the real world,” Bonen said. “It's been difficult, but skating keeps us together.”