Words by Ryan Clements
Photos and Captions by Rob Meronek

DMFP - gap to backside noseblunt slide during Best Trick at AmsterDamn Am 2007

Ruben Rodriguez - big flip frontside boardslide

Danny Cerezini - hardflip

Dustin Blauvelt - frontside 270 switch front board

Danny Cerezini - nollie crook

Ruben Rodriguez - nollie heelflip back lip

DJ Wade and P-Stone - thanks for all the entertaining times on this trip

David Loy - gap lipslide

Dirty Bird watched the entire contest. We should have let her judge

Nihilist was playing during Best Trick

This cannon shot t-shirts into the crowd like we were in a pirate ship

Baby Lamb is DMFP's new best friend after he found out he got a hooka for first place in Best Trick

Top three was Danny Cerezini (2nd), John Dickson (1st), and Alex Mizurov (3rd)

Lacey Baker swept Donovan Piscopo off his feet

Dirty Bird has had quite a life partying all over Europe for the last month, nearly getting kidnapped, and watching some damn good skateboarding. Watch for P-Stone's Dirty Bird interview on Fuel TV

DJ Wade ate poop on the bike while transporting his records and other gear. It's not easy getting around on a bike with a ton of gear

Dirty Bird is partying with the fungus

A close up of the fungus. Gravette had a wild ride on these

Dirty Bird is hanging out and partying all day today during the Finals, but he's under heavy guard due to Thomas Kring's spies sent in to kindnap so Dirty doesn't make it back to Tampa. Not only will Dirty get back to Tampa, she's coming back to CPH Pro 2008. I think Schaefer is going to nollie right after this. Censored shirt for the sensitive American audience

As General Manager of Skatepark of Tampa, Clements is shocked that employees are working the snack bar while burning up hash. Body would be psyched if he could do this in our snack bar. They also serve plenty of beer here

The Dirty Bird kidnapping thing is serious. Clements went down on his bike while Kring's recruits, Camilla and Annika, tried to make a dash for Dirty. I don't know if David Loy can handle protecting Dirty Bird. He can blunt fakie with her, though

Kris Vile - big spin frontside bluntslide fakie

Cody Davis - nollie crook

Danny Cerezini - nollie fsbs fakie

Danny Cerezini - nollie big spin back lip fakie

John Dickson - varial heelflip boardslide

Dustin Blauvelt - nollie heelflip backside 360

Justin Figueroa - switch bigspin front board

Leander Geelhoed - backside noseblunt slide

Nelson Mosikili - cab back lip

Riley Hawk - kickflip frontside boardslide

Sebastiaan Vijverberg - kickflip backside nosegrind

Who dat? BSNG revert

Tony Tave was here with the Circa crew on tour

Collin Provost - frontside nosegrind

David Gravette - nosebonk on the kink

Chris Troy - back smith

Anthony Schultz - ollie over into the small bank

David Gravette - gap lip

Who dat? I don't know, but he skated way too much between runs. This is a back lip

Geoff Rowley asked Curren Caples to be on Flip so now he's on Flip. This is a kickflip boardslide

Donovan Piscopo - kickflip frontside boardslide

About four hours into the first day, Baby Lamb's rented bike got run over by a street sweeper. Stuff like this is always happening to the Gravette. He's hitching rides on the board now with DMFP

The Bad $h!t show was super packed and hot as the sun. Dirty Bird almost got kidnapped multiple times by Thomas Kring's secret CPH crew sent in to retrieve the bird

John Dickson - nollie frontside feeble

Max Genin - back smith

How are you going to get serious in a city that has legalized marijuana, hallucinogenic mushrooms, and prostitution and basically no drinking age? For real though…there is definitely more to Amsterdam than simply man’s pleasures. Here are a few things about the City that I find cool and interesting:

• You can rent a bicycle for a few dollars per day and pretty much ride anywhere you need to go
• There are canals that literally run up and down and side to side and are all over the place
• The Van Gogh Museum, Rembrandt Museum, and the house that Anne Frank hid in from the Nazis are all in A-dam

But we came here for a damn good skateboarding contest as much as we did for the culture. And we weren’t the only Americans that chose to make the trek…there are about 20 kids from the States here and they’re all ripping!

After a night of walking up and down the alleys of the Red Light District, drinking too many Amstels, and staying up too late, the morning came early. Hell, it doesn’t really even get dark here until almost 11pm and then it’s light again before 6am, so it takes a couple of days for the body to adjust.

The contestants made their way to Skatepark Amsterdam just after we did. Rob got Registration all dialed in and we witnessed a great day of skateboarding amongst friends. The plan was to head over to this great cement bowl in some neighborhood that we skated last year. Volcom had the BBQ and beers all ready to go, but soon the rain came.

Apparently it’s been raining quite a bit over here. And to top it off, it’s been a bit chilly, too. Not exactly the finest elements for a proper European vacation, but we’ll deal with it. You know how Volcom does it…they just brought the beers and BBQ right over to Skatepark and it was on.

Once again it was 10pm and still light out before I even realized what had happened.

Damn it was cold on Saturday morning! I guess I just have some pre-conceived notion that it’s supposed to be hot everywhere in the world during the summer, but apparently that isn’t so. We got started a bit late, which ended up being a huge mistake because the Qualifiers went on and on and on.

We can run 100 ams per day without a problem at all, but there seemed to be a bit of a communication barrier between us and the skaters. Granted, we’re in a part of the world where Dutch is the first language, but literally everyone speaks English, too. Point being, if we say, “Hey, please do a trick and hop out real quick so we can keep this Contest rolling,” doesn’t mean to rehearse your entire run in between other runs. Sometimes it took over a minute to clear the course, which made the Contest drag on at times.

But of course we made the best of it and had fun with the kids…and there was some damn good skateboarding to be seen as well. After their two, one-minute runs, nearly all of the American kids made the 30 cut. But things didn’t work out so well for the Skatepark of Tampa Team:

• 33rd – Dylan Perry – he was only one gap to fs 5-0 from making it
• 64th – Abdias Rivera – the funny thing about Abdias is that he’s got the skills to take the whole damn thing, but it just didn’t work out for him

Click here for the rest of the Qualifiers results. We bolted out and went looking for grub immediately. As eclectic of a city as Amsterdam may be, good, healthy meals are difficult to find. After dealing with a crazy lady that was trying to fight the restaurant manager at the first joint, we settled into a nice, quiet Argentinian steakhouse across the street.

From there is was off to the After-Party, where Bad $h!t! and Nihilist played with a premiere of Volcom’s “Let’s Live” in between. BS was great as usual…and if you’ve never seen them then you have no idea what I’m talking about…and Nihilist rocked. People were throwing glasses and DJ Wade broke a bottle over his head. I want to see Let’s Live in a different setting because the video was damn good. When it started to get more chaotic in there, I was out. Got to get to bed early to be ‘on it’ for Sunday…

Rothmeyer and I were the first ones there on Sunday morning and it took at couple of hours before the rest of the crew and skaters made it to Skatepark Amsterdam. With the sun setting at 11pm it’s just really easy to stay out late. I avoided that tornado for the most part, but I can certainly see how others got sucked in.

Everyone got warmed up and settled in. Some looked to be in better shape than their counter-parts. And as rough as he looked in the morning, I don’t know how Dyet managed to judge the entire day, but miraculously he managed to pull it off. You should see him now sitting next to me in the hotel room…oh man.

On to the Contest…all of the Semi-Finalists got two, one-minute runs to make the top 10 and meet the top two qualifiers from Saturday, John Dickson and Sierra Fellers, in the Finals. This is when the Contest gets good to watch and the best shine through. There are always those guys that you wish would have made it (David Gravette, Collin Provost, and Curren Caples), but that’s how it goes. We ran the top 12 and based on the skill level it could have been anyone’s Contest. Here’s how it broke down:

• 12th – 100 Euros – Leander Geelhoed – this is the only ‘new’ friend of ours that was in the Finals…Leander has an amazing style and can bs 180 nosegrind anything, anytime
• 11th – 100 Euros – Dustin Blauvelt – he said it himself, “I just don’t know what happened out there.” Dustin kills it and has the skills to win
• 10th – 100 Euros – Sierra Fellers – I think that I jinxed him when I gave him a “farewell to amateur status and we love you” speech. Yep, Sierra is turning pro, fellas. It’s been our pleasure to watch him grow into what’s going to be a long, healthy, successful professional career. All the best, Sierra
• 9th – 200 Euros – Riley Hawk – son of Birdman is growing into his own with bigspin and kickflip fs boardslides on the rainbow rail. It was nice to see you smile, Riley (Smiley Riley?)
• 8th – 300 Euros – Donovan Piscopo – illest style for a little guy EVER. He’s got the fs bluntslide crail grab on the flat bar and we want to make a point to say ‘thanks’ for his pops for making it out, too
• 7th – 400 Euros – Anthony Schultz – dude’s got the skills to win every contest every time, but staying out ‘til the sun comes up in Amsterdam is quite easy to do. That’s okay because he invented the no-comly to noseblunt in his run on the biggest ramp in the whole damn place!
• 6th – 500 Euros – Justin Figueroa – he entered last minute because of a bum ankle and claimed not to have full-flick potential, but Figgy’s mind control took over and he powered through his injury and into some Euros
• 5th – 1000 Euros – Shuriken Shannon – I love the fact that Black Label has a black skater and teammate Chris Troy (who unfortunately didn’t make the cut) cheered on his boy during each and every run
• 4th – 1250 Euros – David Loy – my current new all-around favorite based on skating and personality combined. When he wasn’t gapping to 5-0 or lipslide on the cement hubba he was hanging up at the judging area keeping time for his fellow competitors. Props to his pops Dennis for bringing all of the kids out, too
• 3rd – 1500 Euros – Alex Mizurov – last year’s eS Game of SKATE winner can do all of his flat-ground tricks in an effortless manner over hips and pyramids
• 2nd – 2500 Euros – Danny Cerezini – I can’t remember Danny ever winning a contest, but he was damn close on this one. His trick selection is amazing and he skates so smooth and under control, making him very enjoyable to watch
• 1st – 5000 Euros – John Dickson – who? Yeah, I know. I know of John because he’s been to a few of our events, but he’s never made as much of an impact on me as he did this past weekend. He’s literally got moves on every single obstacle, and his well-roundedness got him the gold!

Immediately following the Finals was Best Trick, but this time instead of your standard DJ Wade tunes we had a live performance from Nihilist right there on the platform in front of the obstacles. The band rocked and really added to the vibe and good time. It was an open, 30-minute Jam on the flat-bar/handrail and rainbow ledge, but we kept extending it by saying, “Just play one more song,” in order to see Ruben Rodrigues’ gap kickflip bs lipslide (didn’t land) and Sierra’s gap kickflip fs lipslide (nailed it). Here are the rest of the tricks:

• 7th – 100 Euros – Justin Figueroa – gap kickflip to boardslide fakie
• 6th – 100 Euros – Shuriken Shannon – kickflip fs crooks on the rainbow ledge
• 5th – 100 Euros – Danny Cerezini – kickflip bs overcrooks and nollie flip crooks on the rainbow ledge
• 4th – 200 Euros – Leander Geelhoed – backside 180 kickflip nosegrind on the rainbow ledge
• 3rd – 300 Euros – Ruben Rodrigues – gap to fs feeble on the handrail…damn
• 2nd – 400 Euros – Sierra Fellers – kickflip fs lipslide over the damn gap and down the handrail!
• 1st – 500 Euros – Dylan MF Perry! – hell yeah, Dylan! He claimed it prior and proceeded to nail the gap to bs noseblunt. Psyched!

We ended up hanging with the flowing beers at the Park for a bit. I still can’t get over that people drink and smoke cigs, weed, and hash constantly here, without even thinking twice. Took the ferry back and went out for a nice dinner again at the same Argentinian joint and then ended up at The Minds, which was a punker/skateboarder bar with cheap beers. The décor looked like 80’s punk with boots hanging from the ceiling and old decks on the walls…good vibe and we need a place like that in Tampa.

Working with the guys at Volcom is the best. They think of everything that you might not have thought of and already have a plan of action on how to make it happen. So thanks to Jebrane and Hans for being so on it. And thanks to Elske and Michael from Skatepark Amsterdam for the great hospitality. I can’t forget the American pros that made it out…Tony Tave, Caswell Berry, and Tony Trujillo. Finally, thanks to all of the skaters for being there. We couldn’t do it without you and we truly appreciate the opportunity. And it looks like we’ve already been cleared for next year, so goodbye only for now, Amsterdam…

Ryan