I remember my first experience of buying trucks, It would have been around 12-14 years ago now, I had a Tubo 2 board that I bought with my pocket money for £12 off some guy in the market. This was the very beginning of a life long passion for skateboarding, sadly this was cut short after my brother stood on my new rig and the cheap nasty trucks crumbled under his measly 8 stone in weight.
Thus the first lesson of trucks being important started here, I immediate realised that this piece of shit skateboard was not up to the job, I fondly remember grabbing my copy of RAD and flicking through to the Rollersnakes advert and begging my Dad to buy me some ventures, he was amazed that just one truck cost the price of my whole first board and here in lies my point, These ventures changed everything and venture treated me well and in return I stuck with these trucks for many years, and this is the thing once you settle on a certain truck it becomes a long term relationship.
So with some trepidation I agreed to try out the new Tensor Lightweight Response Trucks in a great black and red colourway. I know everyone has their truck of choice and I am sure that all the pro riders for Tensor are getting a truck they love to ride and money in the bank, which can’t be bad by any means. I on the other hand found none of these benefits, yes they looked amazing, but to be blunt they were total shit, and this is the reason.
They were to low for a start. Wheel bite was now a daily occurrence and I am not just talking about landing and getting it but even carving round bowls it would happen sending me flying off the front, and the biggest issue was the back truck developed a crack all the way around the axel within a week, yet there was mostly ledge skating taking place that week and at the most a few games of skate, but I don’t recall any supper heavy landings. I can only assume they were faulty as in 14 years of riding venture and Indies only two trucks have broken and mostly it’s the base plate or kingpin.
If you want a honest review of these trucks I guess a cross section of different riders would be the best way to go, If you want my opinion on Tensor, they had the opportunity to steal away a customer from one of their competitors and they simply blew it.
Trucks are an integral part of your rig and you need to know that they can perform and perform these did not. There is some good news to come out of this, whist on a trip to Barca I gave away my set up to a young kid that had fucked old trucks and a board that had seen better days, so in one sense there is a past it thirty something skater moaning about Tensor Trucks and on the other there is a kid in Barca shredding on a new set up, with a slightly cracked axel.
I guess it all worked out well in the end. Dirty Blood is nothing to worry about.
Harrison
3/10