Girl’s Little China Girl
1. Zered Bassett (Zoo York) - $2,500
2. Angel Ramirez (Foundation) - $1,500
3. Ron Deily (Zoo York) - $1,000
Flip’s Extremely Sorry
1. Jani Laitiala (Blind) - $2,500
2. Nick Trapasso (Toy Machine) - $1,500
3. Louie Lopez (Flip) - $1,000
Creature’s Hesh Cross
1. Vince Del Valle (Black Label) - $2,500
2. Angel Ramirez (Foundation) - $1,500
3. Jani Laitiala (Blind) - $1,000
Black Label’s Drunk Tank
1. Nick Merlino (Foundation) - $2,500
2. Billy Marks (Toy Machine) - $1,500
3. Felipe Ortiz (Blind) - $1,000
Top Am Performance: Nick Merlino (Foundation) - $5,000
Top Pro Performance: Jani Laitiala (Blind) - $10,000
Overall Team Winner: Foundation ($30,000), Blind 2nd ($15,000), Toy Machine 3rd ($5,000) Congratulations rippers!
Josh Brooks
Chet Rules. You got that Chester?
Some people might complain that Chet Childress' parts are not too different from one another, but I think that's a stupid critique. In an age where every trick must be gnarlier than the next and the messageboards overload with a mob-like mentality of "This kid needs to go pro NOW!" whenever some up-and-comer does a couple buttery, banging tricks, skateboarding can get dangerously close to painting itself into a corner of a maze that head's to the dead end of gnarliest skateboarder.
I spoke to Childress a few months back about his art show in Portland and we touched on that subject. In fact, he clowned me for even asking about a particular trick - his lien to tail to disaster revert - which, in some ways, I understand. In today's state of skating, that's refreshing. Not everyone is caught up in tricks, but sometimes you can see that the love of just rolling and letting skateboarding happen organically gets lost at times. So, when you see Chet's part from "God Save the Label" (it's posted up on the Black Label site) - filmed entirely at Burnside -it transends the contemporary sandtrap of "tricknocentric" video parts and makes skateboarding look fun again. Like it's supposed to...
