That'll Be A Letter

eS came through Tampa on their Game of SKATE tour last Monday.


Let's get this thing going.


Of course RayRay was there. Yonis Molina took him out before semi-finals though.


All of Tampa is totally thrilled Robbie Kirkland is home in Tampa again; especially Scotty


Bristol is back from a nasty injury


Two blog posts with shotguns. Jacob Krajewski asked me to shoot this


Schaefer got into making fun of dudes pretty early into the event


Ha.


Brian- in between Twitter updates


Shaqueefa Threads' Bert and Ernie, Tommy Presley and Chris Jata


RayRay- tre flip




AlBow


Jata- nollie heel


RayRay- switch flip


Sam Bianchini- tre flip


Sam Bianchini- switch heel


Mike Espinosa- switch flip


PJ Castellano- switch flip


PJ Castellano- switch hardflip


PJ- switch backside flip


PJ- just realizing he's won. Congratulations PJ!


Proud Clem


Top 2


I could, but I won't

Thanks for coming out eS! See you next year.

Dungeon Days.

After I got back from Miami Porpe called me and told me to come back to the maintenance warehouse of the park, otherwise known as "the dungeon."

"What's going on?"

"Just come back to the dungeon." He simply replied.

I came back to see a new addition to Frosty's warehouse. The Quarterpipe to wallride got a slight facelift when Frosty and his boys took the guts out of the cinder block walls making a lip. They also painted a huge devils face onto the wall, so you're stalling lip tricks inside the devil's mouth. Pretty gnarly. Most men would think of skating something and stalling on the devil's bottom lip as a sort of tempting fate, but I came to realize Frosty and the rest of the Tampa tranny posse aren't most men.


Frosty.


Back Smith.


Chris Lehman, Rock & Roll. He did came down on his hand, which was already cut but had scabbed over. The scab broke. He just covered his palm with duct tape.


After the bail, Giles runs to his friends side.


Later he would do a ridiculous trick on the wall. But that's going to one of his sponsors for an ad.


Landed it next try though.


George Evans was visiting from Jacksonville.


Front Smith.


The Dungeon.


Salad jam.


Switch Pole Jam.


This was a bad idea. No one landed it but it was still pretty funny to watch.


Frontside Boneless.

Frontside Air Party:



Then, a really great idea:

Too bad nothing happened.


Then, Giles decides he wants some of the wall.


It was insane. I need to keep that one off the internet too. Sorry.






Bristol's hurt, but that doesn't mean we don't still get photos.


A knife fight almost broke out.

All in all, gnarly session.

How Loco Can You Get?

I went to Miami with Skatepark of Tampa for Manny Mania. It was a short but fun trip.


If partying Friday night in Ybor was a contest Dylan would have at least gotten top 3. This was the next morning, sleeping on Porpe's porch.


We got to Miami and the hotel Red Bull put us in was Downtown. It was a really swanky Hilton. This was the outdoor lobby. Reminded me of A Night At The Roxbury when Doug and Steve have the idea for the nightclub where outside the club was the inside and vice versa.


"Hey, we got 3 hours before the contest, let's go street skate. Oh wait, it's raining." I forgot it rains everyday in Miami.


TJ Sparks came with us. I botched the idea I had for this photo.


Chris Blake, Crooked Grind. Started the contest off with this. Pretty cool.


Brad Cromer Feeble Grinded across the whole bar.


Some very attractive girl shooting photos (I should've said something charming to her) wanted to get a higher up angle but something seemed to be holding her up from her goal. She asked Joel for help and he promptly grabbed her camera and stood right on top of a stool and shot a photo to check the angle.


The judges deciding on a who can move on to finals.


RB Umali and Frankie are OG's as far as documenting Skateboarding on the East Coast goes. I grew up watching RB's footage in old Zoo York videos and seeing Frankie's photos in Strength Magazine (RIP) so I thought it would be cool to shoot a photo of both of them. Then this News man stepped in. Eh.


Richie was skating really well in Manny Mania MIA and started trying to manual the wave pad (I don't know the real name for it, ask Al Russell, he built it) and trying Impossible's out of it. He didn't make it, which sucks, but he was getting really, really looped out trying them. Who knew a Manual contest would have such wild bails?


This is when our tire shredded off half of its tread in the Everglades.


Dylan reamined beanied despite the heat and humidity.


Scott got in a quick tag on the barrier.


Gas stop skate spot in Sarasota.


Guard Dog wasn't hyped on my angle.


Got back to the park where we were supposed to shoot an Element demo right as it ended thanks to the astonishingly poor service at the Tire Kingdom in Naples. Ever had someone take almost 2 hours to sell you a tire and put it on your car? Ugh.


Bam was there. It's nice to see he still draws a crowd. I'd like to pretend they were all there to see Levi Brown pop tricks 2 feet higher than anyone else, but sadly I'd just be kidding myself.