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66 THRASH M.
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SANTA
CRUZ
NSA Backyard Series #2
Ford's Lot, Santa Cruz, July 14, 1990
Story by Juan Deddly
1 was 8:00 a.m. Saturday July 15. In the heart of
downtown Santa Cruz guys were hustling and
hammering on street ramps for NSA's second backyard
series event of the season. Meanwhile, I was stuck in
S.F., burning time as I waited for a Suzuki Samarai to pull
up and carry me to the scene of the action. My trucks had
practically worn to the axle from grinding the curb and my
face was covered in a cold sweat of anticipation.
At 10:00 a.m. my bowels were getting a helluva shake in
the Samarai buckets. Hell, it would've been worth a night's
sleep to skate the whole way rather than pinching the
bladder non-stop.
I reached the Santa Cruz madness at 10:50 a.m.
Everywhere, skaters claimed the terrain. It looked like a
street course, but from what I understand, it's actually the
site of old Ford's Department store. Now it's called Ford's
lot. Due to the catastrophic quake that centralized here a
few months back, the place is gone. Nothing left but
cement, tile and blacktop. A public parking lot that was fine
for autos but a pitted and poor skate surface.
At 11:05 a.m. I noticed a fat bulldog cop writing a ticket to
a youngster for casually taking his morning skate on the
way to a game of pinball. "Is that justice?" I asked. "Is that
proper?"
Her reply: "Yes,"
It's one thing to be a cop but lying to yourself is another
story.
By noon all the big hats of the industry were lounging
about. A steady hum of speculation buzzed as to who was
going to take the event. The heat was rising, the skater to
spectator ratio dropping. This time, there was no spectator
fee.
A large crowd of about 500 began to swell. Cops were
beginning to surface after waking up from their hangovers.
The skaters were safe, well, at least the ones that were
busy skating in the contest. The ones on the street were all
getting open container tickets.
Photographers everywhere grabbed the moment. Don
Bostick shelled out play-by-play action as the competitors
made splinters of the wooden ramps. A course check
revealed: a spine, a bank-style ramp with a corner and a
mogul with a bump. There was also two quarter-pipes
fashioned in a hip-style trip, an Evel Knievel launch set up
with landing ramp, a mini-launcher over a garbage can, a
face-high quarter-pipe, a few ragged slider bars and a box
ramp wall-jammer.
1:30 p.m. "Where were Natas and Thiebaud?" I
wondered. Ditto for Mark Gonzales. The gnarly surface had
some guys hiding, or maybe they were sick or injured.
or...maybe they just didn't like to skate.
Others, however, dauntlessly shredded the course. Scott
Oster did a G-turn on the roughest section. "This surface is
pretty bad," remarked Omar Hassan, prior to tweaking a
chest-high ollie over the garbage can. It was fun watching
everyone try to get speed on this track. No worry though.
The surface was merely industrial, providing the extra
challenge that these riders needed to show who has the
biggest onions.
Clockwise from Left: Top gun fustin Girard unleashed a handful of streetwise
tactics on and above the chunky surfaces of Ford's lot. One-footed offie-to-
lakie Valley girls checkin' out the numble. No stranger to the air show, Omar
Hassan hovers a lengthy ollie-to-mute grab before a captive audience.
Background: David Hackett busts a handstand for the masses