Click here to see a photo gallery of the skateboard competition.

This is a contest for street skaters, who ride rails and do kickflips down stairs.

“What you guys walk up, we like to skate down,” says A.J. Vossler, 22, a YMCA employee who was behind the microphone at the YMCA Chesley Roller Sport Park Saturday afternoon.

Eighteen competitors, ages 13 through 23, competed in a series of one-on-one contests to measure skill under pressure.

There’s a skatepark just next door, with ramps and jumps that promise high speed and lots of airtime.

But this style, called “flat land” or “street,” shows off what skaters can do with just a kick and their wits.

A lot of the kids here, Vossler explains, aren’t “park rats;” they spend more time on the street.

“A lot of these kids are at the gov...,” he says, trailing off because he probably doesn’t want their haunts published.

If the onlookers are any indication, though, skateboarding isn’t the taboo it once was.

You know it can’t be so bad when a 96-year-old woman rolls by and nods approvingly.

Betty Chesley, for whom the park is named along with late husband B.H., wanted to see if the contest was going well, and she seemed satisfied.

Chesley said she and B.H. wanted an outlet for all the kids who aren’t good at typical sports and otherwise would have little opportunity for recreation.

Eddie Williams, 16, has been skating for six or so years and says most parents are cool with it.

And, pipes in friend Alex Peterson, most skaters wouldn’t care what their parents thought.