On Sunday, I went to that big contest out by the huge steel globe in Flushing Meadows, Queens. The Maloof "Money Cup".
Number one disappointment: my good friends' son, Alex Olson, did not make the finals. After that it was just a "recon" mission to see what was going on. With $250,000 in cash and prizes, one would figure the skating would be incredible. Well as far as i'm concerned it wasn't! Some stuff was OK, but didn't seem like much considering these "Pros" land less than 30% of what they attempted, and even then, relative to the skate videos and magazine sequences i've seen, not such a big deal.
I was happy to see some old friends and meet some new ones and some nice fans too, good times, but the skating was horribly disappointing. That said, I could see there was some incredible talent out there... But i sure didn't miss not having my real camera, I took just a few stills and a few movies with my little digi, that's it.
In the 70's we used to repeat: "Silly Rabbit, Trix are for Kids!" - main difference: they pay them a lot for tricks now... even if they don't make them half of the time. (Oh yeah, the "kids" are a lot older now too!)
Here's one cool one:
Here's the scene:
What do you think Steve?
btw. please don't think i'm hating on the younger generations, cause i'm not, i'm just acknowledging times have changed and while there is a lot of good in most progress, and great that kids are doing their own thing, it's just not as shiny to me as it is to most, that's all, I'm not bitter one bit.
woah! you were in nyc! Then that might have actually been you that I saw outside cafe orlan on St. Marks! I did a double take, and wanted to say hello, but figured since i'm a mere admiring fan I wouldn't bother.
ReplyDeleteIt's easier to digest when you see it edited on TV or a video.
ReplyDeleteI can't say that I care much for the layout of the park. Perhaps a more inspired design would have brought out better skating.
ReplyDelete"...what they’re doing is mostly falling. They’re doing a lot of attempts at a trick, but they don’t nail it very often. Most of the skating that I see is just push at the rail or the stairs, try a trick, fall and walk back ... Street skating just wasn’t exciting. It didn’t look fun."
ReplyDelete-Ben Schroeder, answering the question, "What pissed you off about street skating getting popular over vert?" in Juice