CHAPTE
RODRIGUEZ TOLAND OSCAR-JORDAN-MCGILL MCBRIDE SAIZ SHELBY GRIFFIN
began with a rider's meeting. Helmet straps
were cinched-up and the entrants were
broken down into 15 five man jams. Each
jam lasted five minutes. The format has
some drawbacks, like when only two
skaters showed for a five man jam or when
you are watching one skater and you hear
the crowd screaming about someone else.
A few complained there were too many on
the course at once. Most agreed that it's
more like a real street session and gives
the skaters more time (five minutes) as
opposed to a skimpy two runs at 50 sec-
onds apiece. Best of all, it made for total
chaos while allowing the
skaters to do their thing. It
probably wouldn't work on
Second place Ray
Barbee (above)
coasts a manual to
a vert ramp, but it would
frontside shove it off be fun as hell watching the
the desk. Wanted:
Dead or alive. In-line
victim (middle) prior
to the hazing. Win-
ning smile and the
check to prove it.
Willy-boy (bottom)
and the trophy.
pros do battle like the
American Gladiators. Early
favorites that didn't make
the fifteen cut were: Agah
who nallied to everything,
Way's frontside noseslide
shove-it body varials, and
Kelch's backside tailslide
shove-it. Throughout quali-
fying it was bails galore, with tricks nowa-
days like "try ten, make one." Some
entrants went with fifteen copies of the
same trick while others made one insane
trick the entire contest.
The finals wore run in five heats of three
with three minutes for each heat. Those rid-
ers were: Josh Beagle, his first pro contest
jitters didn't bother him when he was on the
course, Henry Sanchez, who did switch-
stance double kickflips, Tom Knox, who
was his usual speedy solf and ended-up
tied with Jeff Toland who was frontside
pressure flipping at will. Wace Speyer was
robbed, after killing the course at speed he
even ollied the desk/platform/sidewalk, but
ended up eleventh. San Jo ripper Tim
Brauch was a victim of the name game.
Nobody knew who he was and his consis-
tent ripping went largely unnoticed. Mike
Carroll ended up ninth with his trademark
noseslides and an un-aided
backside lipslide on the
desk. Lance Conklin made
eighth with solid flatland and
street oriented blazing..
Jovontae Turner who wore a
knit helmet and strolled to
seventh by floating big ollies
and kickflip 180's.
Gershon Mosely took some
heinous dumps in practice,
but he stayed on f-side 180°
nose-tap fakie over the desk
Evel Kneival style when it
counted and made sixth.
Tony Hawk tailslid and
impossibled to fifth. Rick
Howard was on fire. He made shit so deep
that it cannot be named for fear of mankind
and landed fourth. Jumping John Cardiel
qualified first with huge
backside 180's and
nose bluntslides over
the desk, but settled for
third place following the
finals. Ray Barbee took
home second with
patented Barbee foot-
work and the flow that
cannot be beat. Ray
taught most of these
guys how to skate and
took flatland and foot-
work to new heights.
Top Cat Willy Santos
was technical yet
relaxed on his way to
victory. his switchstance
frontside 180° to manual to backside 180°
off the desk was stylish yet ruthless.
During the finals, actually during Santos
heat, some dipshit rollerblader tried to
crash the party. When he went for his sec-
ond pass on the course, he was pelted with
beer cans, fruit and ice and finally tackled
by Dave Warne. He asked for it and he got
it. He eventually got a
bucket of ice dumped
over his head by Nick Ter-
shay and the crowd went
wild. Upon leaving he was
heard to remark, "You hate
me because I'm better
than you. The trophies
were doled out and the
ramps and cabinets were
overturned, so the party
was over. In six hours, the
whole contest was a done
deal, MC KT reminded all
to call mom and everyone
went separate ways. The
judging was criticized with
everything from "it sucked" to "who cares?
Don't ask Brian Ferdinand who actually
qualified eighth place but got lost in the
shuffle and left out of
the finals. He still
ripped and everyone
knew it. Can't take that
away. This contest.
proved that this is not a
perfect world and there
is no such thing as a
perfect ten. It also
proved we don't need
contests for anything
more than getting ev-
eryone together to
rage. Hats off to Jean
Hoffman, Mario Mar-
tinez, Roger Doyle.
Chris Cook, Bobby
Kuhns, Jesse Fisher,
Anthony Carney, Rick Kosick, Jeremy
Renteria and Pierre, who all worked hard
and made it happen. Bottom line: all the
top pros were there and the skating was
about as raw as it gets.
TOLAND
CHAPTER
Metull
Gende Draft
CHAPTER
Call Re
CHAPTER 7
chapter
7
"To climb steep hills, requires slow pace at first." Shakespeare
...matt rodriguez...
CHAPTER
SEVEN
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