Make-A-Wish Road Trip 2003 Day 3 Article at Skatepark of Tampa

Make-A-Wish Road Trip 2003 Day 3

Posted on Sunday, November 16, 2003 by Ryan

Make-A-Wish Road Trip 2003
By Ryan Clements
Saturday the 15th
    After a pretty decent free breakfast at the hotel, the entire crew headed off to Southside and had what ended up being a ‘private session.’ Due to the design, the place is tough to skate with a lot of people. Although it was 10am, all the guys had smiles on their faces. Nate Broussard joined in with the boys and showed us how to skate a step-up, but the “winner” of the session was definitely Rob Meronek. I don’t know how he does it, but Rob is coming up at 32. Hit ‘em up, Rob!

    About an hour later, the place started to get a few more skaters coming in and cruising around, but no one was complaining since it was the likes of Trujillo, Drehobl, and Darrel Stanton. Right before 1pm, it seemed like they opened the floodgates; everything was going off – huge crowd with stoked kids and a great vibe that I only get from the Texas Skate Jam. You’ll just have to go for yourself to experience it.

    As for the skating, I hope that Rob took enough pics for you to enjoy it because I’m certainly not going to be able to write about everything. Let’s just say that it was very entertaining. There are two things that stick out in my head though. One, that nosepick that Mike V. did on that wall was insane. You should have seen how many slams he took to make one perfectly. He actually made one and rode across half of the bowl with only a slight slide-out, but that wasn’t good enough…he had to do it again. All politics aside – I don’t care about your previous opinions of Mike’s personality – he is one of the gnarliest guys out there and it was rad that he made the trip to Texas.

    Two, and this is the best part so I’ll cut right to the chase; Ian Gow won Best Trick on the hubba! There must have been 30 skaters in it and the contest was set up in a jam format. But due to space restraints, all of the entrants literally had to wait in line and take turns. It was rather funny to see them do that considering $5000 was on the line. The pros that I recall are Brian Sumner, Jesse Paez, Malcolm Watson, Matt Pailes, Ryan Sheckler, and a ton of ripping ams like Braden Fitzgerald, Daryl Angel, John White, Aaron Perko, and many more that you’ve never heard of. Sumner was working on the kf back noseblunt, Paez made the 360 flip noseslide, and Fitzgerald nailed a 360 flip 5-0, but Ian Gow’s kf nosegrind was the one that took it.

    Just so all of you punks back in Tampa have the story straight, Ian doesn’t have $5000 cash to bring home. Since the event is benefiting Make-A-Wish, the money gets donated to the Foundation in Ian’s name (not like he needs the tax write-off). The least we could do is take Ian out to dinner wherever he wanted to go. He picked Chili’s. I respect modesty. Speaking of being modest, upon returning to the hotel I spent the remainder of the evening chatting with Stacey Lowery about the skateboarding industry. I like his viewpoints.

    Now it’s Sunday morning at 9:23am and I’m going to try and get us in on another private session…

Not sure who this is - backside noseblunt slide Chico Brenes - nollie backside heel Chico Brenes nollie heel The crowd inside The crowd outside
Danny Supa - big flip Diego Bucheri - frontside 360 Not sure who this is - front crook Jarret Berry - inward heel Jarett Berry - switch bluntslide
Jereme Rogers - kickflip John Goeman - pop shuv John White - 360 flip Malcom Watson - 360 flip Nate Jones - frontside flip
Not sure who this is - nollie nose blunt slide Paul Rodriguez - nollie crook Paul Rodriguez - nollie heel Paul Rodriguez - switch 5-0 Paul Rodriguez - switch front bluntslide
Paul Rodriguez - switch tail slide Paul Rodriguez - switch 360 flip Peter Ramondetta - 360 flip Reese Forbes - 360 flip - photo by Afro-Jim Rob Meronek - 360 flip - photo by Afro-Jim
Ryan Sheckler - gap kickflip 5-0 Ryan Sheckler - kickflip front board Scotty Conley - wallie to 50-50 Stacey Lowry - frontside flip Stacy Lowry - gap nosegrind
Stacey Lowry - pop shuv shifty Steve Brandi - ollie over the rail Texas mullet Texas rat tail Tony Trujillo - 360 flip
What kind of dork does a website and puts photos of himself up? Me - and I didn't even land it. I'll do it tomorrow, though. Rob Meronek - kickflip over the flat bar Ryan Sheckler - gap kickflip 5050 Ryan Sheckler - gigantic frontside flip over the super steep and large hip Ryan Sheckler - fakie flip Ryan Sheckler - frontside boardslide big spin out
Tony Trujillo - backside flip

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