Once again, the craziest tricks from everybody, the toughest place to be a judge, and the infamous 3 block – Fleetwood skate park. Halfway into the Mini category, your brain really starts wondering what is going to happen in Advanced. If the Mini’s are this good, what are the top skaters going to be like… It was a beautiful day, nice and warm and sunny, the heatwave finally disbursed, but it was still hot enough. When I was pulling up in the morning there was already 50 people there rippin it. While the staff was getting set up, I went and skated for about a half hour. It was chaotic trying to dodge through so many people in such a small park, but it seemed like everyone was managing. The young kids were all flying out of the quarter pipe in a 12 person train, little dudes were kickflipping the 2 block and blasting effortless ollies over the big 3, and everyone was having a great time together.

12:30, time to start. We had 12 kids in the Mini, and 16 in Beginner so I was sending them 2 at a time. This made it difficult with the talent that was present. It was so hard to pay attention to both kids, because every time you turned your head, someone was doing something amazing. Nick Logan must have done 3 or 4 tricks that he made up that were just crazy, Luke Thodos demo’d the whole park making all the normal sized ledges and rails look humungous, and just landing everything. Desmond Fisher was finally landing tricks in his runs. This kid’s got some serious talent and he goes for it. Unfortunately a lot of the time he skates really good all day and then has difficulty in his runs, but not today. Solid airs out of the quarter pipe, ollies over the 3 block and kickflipping the 2 block easily. I saw Matthew McCauley try to kickflip that 2 block a ton of times throughout the day but never saw him ride away, didn’t matter though because he finished off 2 really solid runs by kickflipping the 3 block first try as good as it gets. Blam! And this was Mini – 10 years old or younger.

The Beginner category was also insane. Kids busting effortless flip tricks over the hip to hip and up the step up, blasting grabs over the 3 block, 180’s and flips over the 2, and making use of every obstacle there. Keinan Joss was doing some awesome tricks on the quarter pipe, including blunt nosegrabs to fakie, Ciaran Wright was showing off all of his flip trick expertise, and everyone was just trying there hardest to place. The top 3 ended up being Ryan Siemens in 3rd. Ryan ripped up the whole park with lots of ledge tricks, 2nd place went to Max Stephans with his smooth style and tech tricks, and 1st place once again went to Cole Thodos – Melons over the 3 block, backside 5-0’s on the ledge over the pyramid, and some big boardslide action. Beginners are awesome!

So there was actually another girl there other than Carrie Williams for once. Caroline Paskevich showed up before the contest began, and waited patiently for her chance to show off her skills. Her and Carrie both landed lots of good tricks, shovits, 180’s, manuals, etc. It was good to see another girl there and hopefully she shows up for the next 2 contests.
The Intermediates were pretty fun to watch. Jaden started off his runs good and then they both fell apart on him. Still landed some tight tricks though. Big Bad Barry ripped up the park the best he could for 47 years old, powersliders, shovits and hi-jumps. Keegan Anderson had a rare choke day. Usually this kid lands everything he tries, but just couldn’t pull it together this day. Robert Wylie received the loudest cheers from the locals, but the top 3 names were Dakota Dahl, Brent Chreptyk and Brendan Nielsen. Dakota was solid all day all over the ledges and rails, just skating really good and landing his tricks. Brent skated really hard using the the more advanced ledges and rails, even smith grinded down the red rail over the big 6 stair. But neither of them were any match for Brendan. Brendan had 2 perfect runs filled with tough tricks, backside tailslides, lipslides, and crazy combo tricks. Glad to see Brendan finally landing tricks in his runs again. After last summer, I didn’t know if it would ever happen, but he has definitely been proving himself lately. Good job buddy.

Then we finally got to advanced. At the Haiti contest I hosted at Fleetwood in June, Brad Danyluk destroyed the whole park with 2 flawless runs filled with all hard tricks so I was expecting him to do it again, but he didn’t pull through. Still did all the toughest ledge tricks out of everyone there, but missed a couple – and at Fleetwood you can’t miss a trick in Advanced or your out. The Mayor of Fleetwood, Derrick Mayer had the same issue. 3 flip over the 3 block no problem, but then missing 180’s over the rail. Still skated awesome, but not good enough to place. Shameless and Dominic also had this issue. Like I said, you cannot miss a trick in Advanced if you want top 3 at Fleetwood. Cisco Gooding ripped up the park with creative flow and tech tricks making sure he rode away on everything, Jordan Strong had flawless runs filled with manuals, grinds and airs, but both of them put together still wouldn’t have been enough to stop Adam Fontaine this day. Adam is a very consistent skater from Langley who has a ton of ledge and rail tricks, regular and switch, and he lands them all with authority. When Adam is on it, he’s unstoppable. Even with popping his shoulder out of place earlier in the day on a bad wipe out, he still pulled out 2 amazing, and flawless runs taking the big prize.

Best tricks, we had one early in the day on the bump to rail which Ryan Barron won with a Boardlside to Feeble grind. Then we finished off the contest with one down the 3 block. Derrick started it off with a 1st try 3 flip, cancelled out by Dominic. Then Dominic frontside flipped it, cancelled out by Derrick. Fighter backside 180’s it off the wedge – huge, and Jordan strong backside 180 tailgrabbed it. Dominic kcikflip indy’d it, sort of, and backside flipped it. Derrick hardflipped it and nollie kickflipped it. The crowd voted Derrick the winner. Tough 12 minute contest.

RESULTS

MINI: 1. Matthew McCauley; 2. Luke Thodos; 3. Desmond Fisher; 4. Jaden Dahl; 5. Kai Searle; 6. Nick Logan; 7. Shayle Dahl; 8. Zacc Lester; 9. Matthew Zegar; 10. Alex; 11. Dante & Brandon

BEGINNER: 1. Cole Thodos; 2. Max Stephans; 3. Ryan Siemens; 4. Keina Joss & Ciaran Wright; 5. Riley Allen & Matthew Major; 6. Mick Bey; 7. Drew Linfoot; 8. Kory Laan; 9. Dominik P; 10. Royce Lucas & Spencer Nailin; 11. Alex; 12. Jayden Sandhu; 13. Sean Beatz

GIRLS: 1. Carrie Williams; 2. Caroline Paskevich

INTERMEDIATE: 1. Brendan Nielsen; 2. Brent Chreptyk; 3. Dakota Dahl; 4. Jaden Easton-Ellett; 5. Barry Blatter; 6. Sean LaFontaine; 7. Keegan Anderson; 8. Jonathan Kampen; 9. Robert Wylie; 10. Sebastien

ADVANCED: 1. Adam Fontaine; 2. Jordan Strong; 3. Cisco Gooding; 4. Fighter; 5. Dominic DeVries; 6. Shameless; 7. B-Rad Danyluk; 8. Derrick Mayer; 9. Rayn Barron & Nathan Lintunen

See you at Guildford – September 4th