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| M.R.'s YMCA Bowl Bash
sponsored by Tracker Trucks
Before I start with the contest day particulars let me first put
in a big thanks to Mike Rogers. If
there is a Skateboard Heaven Mike Rogers will definitely make it there some day.
The guy puts endless hours into making sure we all have a good time
skating and asks for nothing in return. The
contest was organized, had some great prizes and everyone had a good time. A few days prior to the contest the phone started to ring and the
emails were coming in from all over. Chris
Baucom, Kelly Lynn, Chuck Dinkins, and Todd Johnson were all confirmed and
en-route from the north end of FL. I even had an email from an old friend, Jim Tesnar (now in
CA), he and Stelmasky were going to try and fly in for it; turned out it was too
“last minute” and they did not. Next
time guys! As they say in
surfing…”Dude you missed it!” The forecast for the day looked like we might have a little rain. Keep your fingers crossed. I would have felt guilty if all these guys drove down and it was cancelled…I suppose we could regroup at Alan’s ramp possibly, in the cool A/C and shelter of the warehouse. I pulled up to the YMCA and things were well underway, Mike Rogers (MR) had a couple large boxes of t-shirts for the competitors, a table of trophies, cash, and lots of prizes from manufacturers (Tracker, Concrete Wave, DogTown, Bahne, Casper). MR even coughed-up almost $1,000.00 of his own money for the cash prizes…(nice that you won some of it to put back in the bank Mike!). A large PA system and sponsor banners all set up around the kidney pool, it looked like the real deal! 1979 revisited! A one-wheeler contest, a longest carve contest, longest 50/50, highest air, and then the GrandMasters (38 & up), and the Masters (30-37) were all part of this flashback day.
As I arrived MR says to me “Chris Baucom was here last night
just killing it.” I took that as
a good sign of things come. The
session going down prior to the contest was epic, as it always is at every
contest, it seems like the “open” skating has the highest energy. Maybe some were keeping their cards close to their chest,
we’ll see. Merrick Crittenden and Marc Simiril showed up. Marc was in from N.C. and staying with the crazed Pumphouse local. These two are nuts; they should have their own movie about two guys that travel the country and have a worm pet shop…oh, Jim Carrey did that already, well if you don’t know Merrick and Marc go rent the movie. Todd Johnson was there, I could pick him out 100 yards away, he had on that green pro-tec from 79…. someone give him a contract for a helmet, they’d sell a ton of them, er maybe. Oh and in regards to helmet design, Kelly finally got some pinstripe tape and recreated his trademark KL helmet design. Very cool. Plus there were a few OG flyaway helmets around the pool too. Back to Todd, he was flowing big time like he lived at this pool, and I know he’s only been here maybe once, ever. Did you ever notice guys like that look great even if they are just carving or kick turning? Just look at guys like Tom Inouye, Mike Folmer, or Christian Hosoi; they look good just rolling! Todd gives me that same feeling when I see him ride.
Alan “Ollie” Gelfand and Sharon Israel were there, good to
see the happy couple. Dan Murray
and his whole family were there. Andrew
was rippin around the park trying to contain himself on this designated “old
mans day”. Bob Beebe was
there happy to take in the festivities. Jim
from Concrete Wave was there; hopefully we’ll see some YMCA footage in the mag
(hint hint). The first contest was the one-wheeler event. Contestants had 30 seconds to get 3 wheels out as many times as possible anywhere in the bowl. Dan Murray set the pace with 14, he was always good at setting the bar in any type of competitive event or show. Other stand-outs were Mike Rogers with 16, then Todd Johnson and Kelly Lynn, both with 17. Todd and Kelly went into a tie-breaker with a new rule of only using the deep end. Todd emerged with 15 while Kelly came up one short at 14. A very cool event that everyone could enter and have fun doing.
Next was the longest tile carve. John “Woody” Woodstock, (old pro skater from the New
York/New Jersey area) headed up the measuring of this event. Which was very difficult to do since every skater had a
different line. The objective was
to ride the tiles as long as possible. Each
skater got three runs. Once again
Todd Johnson took the crown. Longest 50/50 we actually pulled out the tape measure to be exact. But then again we probably didn’t need it. Kurt Bodenshatz can just about 50/50 the entire circumference of the pool. Kurt’s line was a deep end to shallow end 50/50, backside, (regular foot rider)….TWENTY ONE FEET, EIGHT INCHES. Yeah baby!
Highest air was measured with a pre-built measuring stick that could be set on the side of the pool where the rider was planning to launch. Dan Stephans was an early stand out and went on to win this event with a 4’3” frontside air (goofy foot) center of the pool’s deepend. Kurt Bodenshatz followed with a 3’5” indy air over the hip. Other notables were Will Cox’s high frontside airs. And how could I go without mentioning Patio Mendino pulling a frontside air out of the deepend…way to go. Gotta love Patio, he is really digging skateboarding. This guy travels to events and is living it for the love of it. His happiness is contagious.
RAIN…..yes after all this, and we were waiting on the main events, it decides to rain! The crew re-groups under the awning. Chris Baucom the “Rude Boy” is seen whoring beers from Merrick and Marc, chancing that the contest is rained out, or maybe not even caring, just here for a good time. Chris’ third beer down…and the rain stops!! We setup quickly and dry the bowl while the guys pad up again.
Grand Masters: The
format would be that each guy would get a preliminary run.
Following this it would be a “jam” format.
Dan Murray took the first run. He
proceeded to show us some classic forgotten moves like his old trademark trick
of doing a shuvit to 180 kickturn on the vert wall.
I bet Dan has been doing this since 1978, and it still is impressive.
Will Cox followed with his big frontside footplants, frontside airs,
frontside rock-n-rolls, and backside tailtaps.
I’ve seen will skate since the late 70’s, he still skates the same, I
think maybe even better. Aside from Dan, I’m sure he was the oldest guy out there
too. Patio Mendino pulled frontside
airs out in the deepend, and even displayed a very Bobby Valdez looking
handplant. Way to go bro!
Kurt Bodenshatz was killing it, and why not, this is his home turf.
Big indy airs over the hip shallow to deep end, inverts, and disasters
come to mind, all with ease and grace. Pete
Kunz, previous Apple Skatepark employee, was styling out doing real laybacks
inside the pool, and frontside airs, very nice style.
Kelly Lynn had a bag of tricks and was super smooth.
Backside layback to tail, frontside grind to reverts, and a backside tail
stall that just had the crowd holding their breath, (where was the layback
air?), either I missed it you just forgot, I heard people talking wondering when
they would see this piece of history. Chris
“three beers” Baucom took to the bowl quickly like he was going to take
over. Lots of lip tricks, layback
air to inverts, frontside ollies all with great control and style.
However looking back at my notes, I noticed Chris only took about four
runs, which I think hurt him in this type of format (must have been the beer).
Chris Conway was up next showing nice control of the bowl and pulling a
memorable indy air as well. Erik
“Roach” Johansen was showing us all his local lines; backside over the hip
to 50/50 is one of my favorites of his. The
guys continued to ride for 20 minutes in a Jam format while the crowd hooted and
rooted them on. In the end the
results were: 1.
Kurt Bodenshatz- 89.7 2.
Will Cox – 85.97 3.
Chris Baucom – 85.90 4.
Kelly Lynn – 84.65 5.
Pete Kunz – 81.32 6.
Chris Conway – 80.27 7.
Erik “Roach” Johansen – 77.80 8.
Dan Murray – 77.12 9.
Patio Mendino – 74.62 Masters: The Masters had the same format as the Grand Master.
These guys were just younger…30-37 years old.
Mike Rogers was the top of the list.
Mike has such command of this bowl it’s like his second home.
50/50’s, frontside cess slides, frontside rock n rolls, roll out to
manual----back in, tons of tricks with so much control.
Tullie Carlton, one of the two Budweiser brothers in the Masters, the
other being “Redneck Eric”. Tullie was going for nice indy airs out in the
deepend among other rad moves. “Redneck
Eric” was all over the place, however his most memorable moment was some sort
of shallow end comedy routine….(sucks how people remember that weird shit
doesn’t it.) Dan Stephan was also
on fire, big frontside airs that he would launch and thrust them out high and
far, great move. Jeff Valena was
cooking with some nice smith grinds. Todd
Johnson proceeded to ride the bowl like he owned it.
Inverts, backside airs, rockslides, laybacks, layback to tails, frontside
boneless, all smooth as silk. Kurt
Thuemmler, a local surf/skater was ridin with style.
Frontside ollie’s, frontside airs come to mind, great style.
Donnie Gessner zipped around the bowl with his speedy style, frontside
grind to reverts, and many other tricks that were so fast you could hardly tell
what happened, frontside air to tail. Lastly
Chuck Dinkins dropped in for his turn speeding around the bowl very fast,
controlled slides were his unique trick to add to the day.
The results were as follows: 1.
Todd Johnson – 90.22 2.
Mike Rogers – 89.73 3.
Kurt Thuemmler – 85.46 4.
Donnie Gessner – 84.41 5.
Dan Stephan – 83.99 6.
Chuck Dinkins – 81.15 7.
Jeff Valena – 79.73 8.
Tullie Carlton – 77.98 9.
“Redneck Eric” – 77.16 All in all everyone killed it.
The crowd was great, and everyone had a good time.
What else could you ask for? Howard
Montaque’s message in the guestbook was right on…”EVERYONE
there rips and if you weren’t there be at the next one. Its not about winning
its about being there and skating with your friends.” See you all at the Kona Summer Nationals for the OSSS #2.
Go to www.konasummernationals.com
for more info. Then the last contest will be at Vans in Orlando for OSSS #3 the
finals!! |
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