nate the skate was an avid physics student whose main non‑physics interest in life was high‑speed skateboarding. in particular, nate would often don a protective suit of bounce-tex, which he invented, and after working up a high speed on his skateboard, would collide with some object. in this way, he got a gut feel for the physical properties of collisions and succeeded in combining his two passions\.\* on one occasion, the skate, with a mass of 113 kg, including his armor, hurled himself against a 875 kg stationary statue of isaac newton in a perfectly elastic linear collision. as a result, isaac started moving at 1.85 m/s and nate bounced backward.