NSA AMS
Three regional competitions send a new crop amateurs
on their way to the finals in Anaheim, CA.
North Central Regional Qualifier
Rotation Station, Rockford, Illinois
May 25-28, 1989
Freestyle
1. Tim Wadowski
2. Dave Libich
3. Andres Camacho
4. Ken McGaugh
5. Manish LaMay
6 Tim Van Gilder
7. Jeff Stroup
8. Kyle McIntosh
9. Brian Mank
10. Steve Ackney
Streetstyle
1. Rob Dyrdek
2. Jesse Neuhaus
3. Bryan Kothe
4. Brian Mank
5. Brent Kolawski
6. Bob McBride
7. Nate Miller
8. Jose Santiago
9. Brian Patch
10. Eric Murphy
Ramp
1. Dave LaRoux
2. Justin Lynch
3. Bill Fergusson
4. Jason May
5. Eric Frolon
6. Travis Burk
7. Pat Dotson
8. John Coleman
9. Brian Istvanick
10. Rich Williams
Eastern Regional District Qualifier
Ocean Bowl, Ocean City, MD
June 18, 1989
Streetstyle
1. Cocco Santiago
2. Sean Sheffey
3. Bryan Blake
4. Bill Waldman
5. Rob Crowe
6. Chris Pustras
7. Barker Barrett
8. Rob Cocco
9. Kenny Dibenedetti
10. John Burke
Halfpipe
1. Tom Boyle
2. Brian Boyd
3. Mike Conroy
4. Troy Chason
5. Darren Meditto
6. Phil Rouchard
7. Bill Weiss
9. Buska Vidal
Clockwise from Left: Tom am
Tom Boyle tips one. Ocean City
street course view. Mike
Conroy fakie fastplants into
near-miss second place. N.S.A.
mastermind Sonja Catalano.
Photos: Bill Thomas.
YOU MUST BE
NSA Capito
VP TO D
This P
South Central District Qualifier
Skatepark Houston, Houston, TX
April 29, 1989
Streetstyle
1. Ryan Cappuis
2. Charlie Thomas
3. Duane Pitre
4. Sal Barbier
5. Chris Carlstrom
6. David Mills
7. Greg ruiz
8. Lee Brooks
9. Cory Key
9. Reid Moffat
11. Cory Lynch
12. Chip Norton
13. Chris Guerrero
14. Anthony Armstrong
15. Tom Drake
16 Ric Frazier
Ramp
1. Dave Neilson
8. Buster Halterman
2. Mark Roach
3. Gene Hare
4. Mike Crum
5. Brett Roper
6 Jeff McCown
10. Steve Herring
Freestyle
1. Mike Kinney
2. W. L. Sullivan
3. Matt Wood
4. Gred Librizzi
5. Tommy Lingley
6. Henry Candlett
7. J. T. Murphy
8. Joe Ayers
9. Terry Synnot
10. Blair Brown
7. Curtis Hyatt
8. Pat Sherman
9. Cory Thornhill
10. Chris Gentry
11. Danny Carrsal
12. Frank Gardner
13 Jason Espeseth
14. Lyndle Roe
15. Chris Kerner
16. Trey McKinney
EUROPA CUP
by Billy Runaway
Can't you just see it? An indoor arena, a
sea of wide-eyed kids, slick hucksters ped-
dling the newest 97A snake oil, "roadies"
who must be cousins of Chewbacca, and
let's not forget the rides.
Wait just one minute. Where the hell
are we? A carnival? Have you mistakenly
picked up the newest issue of "Big Top Mon-
thly"? Neither, my friend, this is 1989, this
is Essen, West Germany, this is the home
of Europacup Skate contest.
ESSEN,
WEST GERMANY
It is here that one can observe first hand
the paradoxes of modern man in his quest
for entertainment. The same people who
bum on skateboarding when it crosses their
path in real life are now paying good money
to watch it. Then there are the others who
are not interested in the action, opting instead
to brawl for stickers and bother for auto
graphs. Why not? It's so much easier to buy
the video. This brings us to our third species
-those who know nothing about it, don't
care and are rolling in cash... "Step right
up, impressionable young minds and buy
(insert your favorite trendy product) and
you will be (insert word of choice)! If not
completely satisfied, we'll (figure it out)."
Poor Frank Nasworthy must be "rolling" over
in his grave (get it?). Skaters who know who
Mr. Nasworthy is (just kidding, he's not dead).
I salute you.
Those who showed up the day before the
contest were greeted with...well, not much
-just a half-finished street area and several
pieces of steel that would later become one
big piece of a halfpipe. Bernd Boecker saved
the day and satisfied the urge with an offer
to skate the halfpipe in nearby Remscheid.
It was a manly sort of ramp, measuring in
at 16' wide, with 10' transitions (please don't
call them "trannies") and 2' of vertical. This
combination proved to be fatal, inflicting
various injuries on Steve Claar, Mark Lorenz
and Bruno Peeters.
Mr. Wilson was also having a field day at
the contest site, claiming Davie Laerre and
Aaron Deeter as victims, but not before Aaron
opened eyes and blew minds with pivot-to-
fakies, hurricanes and frontside rocks on the
pool corner-you know, the one with 3+ feet
of vertical on it. Oh yeah, that one....
I'm going to spare you the outlandish
details of skaters' nocturnal activities. Make
up your own story: pretend they got real
(insert word of choice) and
everything and then had. on top of the
with (use your imagination).
Contest day saw all of the "rides" (struc-
tures) in place. I would never complain, but
many skaters thought that the streetstyle sur
face was too slippery, that the coping on the
ramp was too sketchy and that the surface
of the ramp was too grippy. (And to think of
all those starving skaters in India...)
Pete Diepes, Old Man Skate Association
kingpin and architect of street area, was quite
content to have created a course without the
usual slide 'n roll bar or used automobile.
There wasn't supposed to be a jump ramp
but some skaters threatened to flood the
arena with their tears, so one was scrounged
up and put in place. Along with that came
a pool corner straight from hell, two back to
back quarterpipes with a spine, and three
other quarterpipe ramps of various configura-
tions, much to some skaters' dismay.
In the halfpipe area, someone had made
a weak attempt at installing a spine leading.
to another halfpipe, creating instead a truly
evil piece of terrain over which only a few
skaters of questionable sanity dared pass.
Kinks or no kinks, the freestyle, street and
halfpipe eliminations took place on Saturday.
The first order of business on Sunday was
the streetstyle. Saturday's survivors took two
runs and, through some space age judging
format-in which the previous day's best
score was divided by the square root of pi-
were ranked. Mikael de Stoppelar from Den-
mark chalked up a 5th place finish, and I'm
almost sure that his extended layback airs
on the pool corner didn't hurt his cause any.
Early favorite Aaron Deeter skated his blown-
up knee into 4th place, but this man will be
back, guaranteed. Young Rasmous Skousen
from Denmark did well against the big boys,
garnering 3rd place. Second and first place
went to Ryan Monihan and Jeff Hedges,
respectively. They did what every winner has
to do: go fast, blaze and above all, stay on.
Gunter Mokulys, Shane Rouse and Chris-
tian Seewaldt went 1-2-3 in freestyle. Could
Gunter's weight room behind the Titus ramp
in Münster be giving him that extra edge?
In the halfpipe finals, the top four qualifiers
were automatically placed in the final jam,
leaving the skaters in the fifth through twelfth
positions to duke it out for the remaining four
spots in the jam. Sean Goff, Soren Aaby,
Lucian Hendrickse, Ralf Middendorf, Neil
Danns Gerd Rieger, Thomas Keller and
Davie Phillips all went into the ring. Davie
Phillips looked mean in the practice heats
with a clean, fast variety of lip tricks but had
trouble staying on for the real thing. Neil.
Danns blazed but was somehow denied a
spot in the finals. Must have been that space
age judging system. The four who did
manage to make it were Sean Goff, Ralf Mid-
dendorf, Lucian Hendrickse and Soren Aaby.
These four went up against Nicky Guer-
rero, Ryan Monihan, Jeff Hedges and Florian
Böhm. Highlighting the jam were some fine
runs by Sean Goff, the only man mental
enough to go over the spine and back dur-
ing the competition. Definitely not a quiche
eater. Both Goff and Middendorf gave
McTwists their best shot, but came up empty.
Ralf is still getting acupuncture from the last
time he miscalculated one, so his hesitation
is more than understandable. Guerrero went
high, fast, and stayed on, with style to
spare-what else is there? Straight-leg front-
side air in the nosebleed zone, fastplant-to-
fakie, and body jars on the spine, just for
starters. Every skater in the final jam was hell-
bent, but when push came to shove Nicky
was voted king of the mountain.
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