Watch: Blind skateboarder Richard Moore shreds Adelaide streets

Skateboarding is hard enough with all your senses but suddenly losing his sight wasn’t enough to grind this local legend down. See him in action

When Richard Moore is on the streets of Adelaide he’s not vision-impaired, he’s just another skateboarder.

Richard, 33, has retinitis pigmentosa, a rare condition that has seen his vision go from normal to just 5 per cent in a little over two years.

He’s now legally blind and has very small patches of vision in each eye and some ability to see some light and shade, but doctors predict complete blindness is probably just months away.

And while he admits that his blindness has impacted his life in every way, he says there was no way it was going to stop him from skateboarding.

Now Richard is a common sight at favourite skate spots on North Terrace, using a cane to find edges and tapping on and off of ledges. He does all the ollies, grinds, flips and slides that make the sport so dynamic and says he may actually skate better now than he did when he was sighted.

But there’s a deeper desire too, a quest to show that skateboarding is for everyone.

“I was diagnosed in late February, 2018, and I didn’t even use a cane for the first year, but from March or April 2019 to now my vision loss has been very quick,” Richard said.

“I lost 80 per cent of my sight in two years.”

Richard inherited RP – as the condition is commonly known – from his mother.

“My mum used a guide dog and has been legally blind for at least 10 years, but I’ve actually overtaken her now,” he said.

Growing up in regional Victoria, Richard said he and his friends would skate at his school during recess and lunch as it was the only concrete in his small town. He also loved BMX riding, but both went on hold as he grew older and concentrated on studying graphic art.

Blind Skateboarder Richard Moore out the front of the SA Museum on North Terrace. Picture: Simon Cross

As his vision began to deteriorate Richard was coming to terms with the fact he might never skate again when he found the Instagram site of Dan Mancina, an American skateboarder with RP who also rides with the help of a cane.

“I was like. ‘hang on, is this guy skating with a cane?’,” he said. “That led me down that path, and I discovered a couple of other blind skaters as well. I thought if they were doing it then I could do it to.”

Having not stepped on a board for two years, Richard said he had to relearn how to ollie (jump the board) and figure out which hand to hold the cane in while he skated.

“I very slowly worked it out and now I’m better than I was when I had sight,” he said.

And his skateboard, Richard said, means he has an instant community anywhere he goes.

“The amount of times I’ve had people literally grab me – with the best of intentions – and try to help me across the road,” he said.

“But if I go to a skate spot or a park with my board then I’m just a skater. No discrimination, no treating me differently, nothing, It’s not even a thing. I’m a skater first and foremost and a blind person second.”

Richard has several irons in the fire when it comes to his skating future, but he said he would love to see adaptive skating days, and even contests, established in Adelaide.

“It such a great culture and it’s open to everyone,” he said.

Instagram: @trilegallyblind