Vans Downtown Showdown Results

Words by Ryan Clements
Photos and Captions by Rob Meronek

Josh Harmony, Billy Marks, Kevin the Team Manager, and Matt Bennett from Toy Machine - they get to sit down and decide how they will split up $50,000. Could you imagine doing that with your friends? Vans, Tylenol, and Scion will be paying Toy Machine bar tabs for quite a while. Billy Marks may have already lost his from throwing dice by the time you read this

Andrew Reynolds accepts some pocket change from Tylenol

I wonder if skateboarding gets a little boring when you can do any trick you want like Chris Cole. He won the Top Pro award and another nice trip to the bank

Angel Ramirez should get some dental work with the $9,000 he took home

You never know whose girlfriend you're talking about, so I'll keep the comments on this photo to myself. It's perfectly ok to look, though

Steve Van Doren's dad started Vans back in 1966. Steve was working the entire time this weekend on the grill and making sure everyone was having a good time. He should get a Host of the Year Award or something

The young and the relentless - Ryan Sheckler and Ryan Clements

I guess you'll be seeing Jereme Rogers' interview on TV. It's supposed to be on the air pretty soon on Fox and Fuel TV

All those buildings you see in the background of all the photos are fake. The insides are empty and are used to create movie sets and stuff like that. The outsides of the building, like the brick, are made of some kind of plastic like material

This consisted of the collective scores from all team members, which was actually even tougher for Toy Machine since they only had three skaters: Billy Marks, Josh Harmony, and Matt Bennett. That works for them though; because that means that they only had to split the money three ways. I heard that they were kicking down a G to Johnny Layton for the hell of it.

With a second in the Tylenol Street Gap , a third in the Scion Bank-to-Bank , a twelfth in the Foundation Big Six , and a first in the Zero Bank/Stair Set , there was no denying that Cole won it.

$5,000 is a ton of money, especially to a struggling am. And since Angel already came up $4,000 on the Foundation Big Six, this additional $5,000 must have seemed like a dream come true. He earned it by skating four of the five obstacles and killing each and every one of them.

They had an official, corporate title for it, but no one cares about that when we’re talking about $5,000. This was actually a last-minute surprise and it was supposed to go to a skater that went above and beyond. So we busted out one of those oversized checks and patted The Boss on the back for being that guy that ‘had it’ at the Showdown.

Other random cool stuff that I remember:

• The majority of the Baker team was there. I saw Szafranski, Greco, Reynolds, Dixon, Ellington, Herman, and even one of those little weefs from Baker 3 all hanging out together. They give off the impression of a ‘real’ team, especially with brand manager/diva, Robin, present as well.
• Vans was selling stuff . No surprise there, right? But guess what. They were sending the proceeds to the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Now that’s a classy move.
• Free food was given out all day long to everyone in attendance. Tips were accepted and donated to the Hurricane Katrina victims, as well.
• In addition to monetary donations, Vans is also driving to Texas with clothing and several thousand pairs of shoes for the Hurricane victims, too.
• If you had a VIP wristbands you could get into a special area where they had free Wahoo’s, a taco joint in California. Good stuff.
• Tony T. and friends drank all of the beer.
• To make things a bit more exciting, the judging panel consisted of editors of the skateboarding mags and expert judge, Jason Rothmeyer, overseeing them all. Those on the panel were:
  • Jake Phelps – Thrasher
  • Eric Stricker – TWS
  • Dave Swift – The Skateboard Mag
  • Jamie Owens - Skateboarder Mag
  • Lance Dawes - SLAP
  Special thanks to Steve Van Doren, Steve Luther, Dave Mateus, Kristy Van Doren, Doug Palladini, and everyone else at Vans for making this event happen. Thanks to Four Down Productions and the Daggers for building the ramps and to Tylenol, Scion, and Epitaph for the sponsorship bling. Thanks to all of the competing teams, pros that came to chill, and all of the spectators that made the Vans Downtown Showdown possible.
  
  

  OVERALL TEAM FINAL RESULTS 1st Toy Machine 67.33 2nd Element 66.90 3rd Girl 61.40 4th Baker 61.10 5th Zero 60.53 6th Foundation 52.07 7th Birdhouse 47.37 8th Almost 21.73 Tylenol Street Gap 1st Girl 82.33 2nd Foundation 78.00 3rd Birdhouse 74.00 4th Toy Machine 69.83 5th Element 68.00 6th Baker 66.00 7th Zero 44.00 8th Almost 0.00 Scion Bank to Bank 1st Birdhouse 74.67 2nd Zero 73.67 3rd Element 71.17 4th Toy Machine 54.33 5th Baker 47.00 6th Foundation 34.83 7th Girl 29.67 8th Almost 16.67 Foundation Big Six 1st Girl 78.17 2nd Element 75.83 3rd Baker 72.83 4th Toy Machine 71.33 5th Zero 61.67 6th Almost 52.33 7th Foundation 43.33 8th Birdhouse 0.00 Girl Torture Totter 1st Girl 64.83 2nd Toy Machine 59.33 3rd Element 57.50 4th Foundation 57.17 5th Baker 49.50 6th Birdhouse 47.50 7th Zero 47.33 8th Almost 39.67 Zero Stair Set/Banks 1st Toy Machine 81.83 2nd Zero 76.00 3rd Baker 70.17 4th Element 62.00 5th Girl 52.00 6th Foundation 47.00 7th Birdhouse 40.67 8th Almost 0.00

  Individual Results Tylenol Street Gap 1st Bryan Herman 91.33 2nd Chris Cole 88.00 3rd Jereme Rogers 87.67 4th Corey Duffel 81.33 5th Nyjah Huston 78.67 6th Sean Malto 77.00 7th Brian Sumner 75.67 8th Angel Ramirez 74.67 9th Aaron Suski 72.33 10th Matt Bennett 71.00 11th Billy Marks 68.67 12th Jeremy Wray 57.33 13th Antwuan Dixon 40.67 14th Ryan Smith 0.00 15th Chris Haslam 0.00 16th Cooper Wilt 0.00 Scion Bank to Bank 1st Andrew Reynolds 94.00 2nd Aaron Suski 78.33 3rd Chris Cole 78.00 4th Billy Marks 75.00 5th Tosh Townend 74.00 6th Steve Nesser 71.00 7th Corey Duffel 69.67 8th Jamie Thomas 69.33 9th Mike Vallely 68.33 10th Eric Koston 59.33 11th Josh Harmony 33.67 12th Daewon Song 33.33 13th Braydon Szafranski 0.00 14th Sean Malto 0.00 15th Gareth Stehr 0.00 16th Cooper Wilt 0.00 Foundation Big Six 1st Angel Ramirez 87.00 2nd Nyjah Huston 86.67 3rd Ryan Sheckler 84.67 4th Andrew Reynolds 82.67 5th Rick McCrank 81.67 6th Josh Harmony 79.00 7th Sean Malto 74.67 8th Jamie Thomas 66.00 9th Tosh Townend 64.67 10th Billy Marks 63.67 11th Kevin Spanky Long 63.00 12th Chris Cole 57.33 13th Chris Haslam 20.00 14th Brian Sumner 0.00 15th Jon Goeman 0.00 16th Ethan Fowler 0.00 Girl Torture Totter 1st Ryan Sheckler 79.33 2nd Rick McCrank 76.00 3rd Kevin Spanky Long 67.33 4th Josh Harmony 65.33 5th Jamie Thomas 63.00 6th Tosh Townend 60.00 7th Angel Ramirez 59.33 8th Gareth Stehr 55.00 9th Jeremy Wray 55.00 10th Eric Koston 53.67 11th Matt Bennett 53.33 12th Steve Nesser 51.67 13th Jon Goeman 43.33 14th Braydon Szafranski 31.67 15th Sheldon Meleshinski 31.67 16th Daewon Song 0.00 Zero Stair Set/Bank 1st Chris Cole 94.67 2nd Jereme Rogers 90.67 3rd Billy Marks 90.33 4th Nyjah Huston 89.00 5th Brian Sumner 74.67 6th Matt Bennett 73.33 7th Antwuan Dixon 72.00 8th Angel Ramirez 70.67 9th Bryan Herman 68.33 10th Sheldon Meleshinski 57.33 11th Mike Vallely 35.00 12th Corey Duffel 23.33 13th Eric Koston 13.33 14th Jon Goeman 6.67 15th Chris Haslam 0.00 16th Cooper Wilt 0.00