Did any one watch the X-Games last week? Thursday night they held the "Big Air" skateboarding competition for the X-Games series and I just happened to be watching... I was sitting in the den half working on a Sudoku puzzle and half watching this contest on the TV. Now keep in mind that I used to skateboard when I was a teenager all those years before GA Law Enforcement allowed me to burn up the roads in my uncool high school car. Yes folks I was a skater and I lived and breathed the idea that I was that good.... Not. I tried to do all the tricks they showed in the skater magazines but, having only a Wal-mart brand board and a lack of cool ramps or rail slides like the professionals sort of held me back. Those were the days of Powell Peralta boards, Vision Street Wear clothes, long skater bangs, double Swatch watches, Tony Hawk and Christian Hosoi were gods, and all I wanted to do was Skate or Die! (SK8 or Die) I religiously purchased Thrasher and Transworld skateboarding magazines and would just drool over all the pics and how much air the pros would catch on those halfpipes and empty concrete pools. Anyway, now the you know my history, back to the X-Games...
First, a little history on the "big air" contest... The contestant basically drops into a halfpipe ramp from 30 or so feet above the bottom and then up the other side and then flys off the ramp 70 feet into the air over onto another halfpipe and then down and up the other side (about 30 ft high of vert ramp) and then that throws him up into the air another some 15 to 20 feet and then drops him back down into the ramp about 40-50 feet of vertical distance... the trick is to land all of the tricks perfectly while still ON the board and not fall off (even after the 70 ft gap jump from ramp to ramp) Yes, it is an absolutely insane contest and these guys are literally acrobats when doing it... You seriously have to watch this contest in order to appreciate the full magnitude of just how dangerous this contest is!
So am watching this contest last Thursday and the first place skater is Jake Brown. Several skaters including him are doing their 4th and 5th attempts at trying to plunge down the huge halfpipe and miraculously land on the board each time they fly down the wooden vertical walls and drop on these monster ramps. Many just keep flying off these boards in mid-air and falling during their run but always a quick crash into the flow of the ramp wood on their knees/knee pads or butts... Well this guy, Jake Brown gets up to do his final run to improve upon his already first place scoring... he takes off and attempts a 720 in the 70 ft gap between ramps and lands it! Now I am out of the chair just watching in amazement! No one has ever pulled that off and on national TV! Now I am all excited and watching this guy... he rides up the next high vertical of the other ramp and somehow seems to lose his balance as soon as he is flying up the high side... his limbs are waving and the board is long gone... and then instead of dropping back down into the flow of the ramp wood his body flies somewhat back into the middle direction of the ramp and he drops flat into the bottom of the ramp from 45+ ft... My mouth is gaping in shock as I watch his lifeless-looking body just laying there in the middle of the ramp bottom. The medics finally run up and the crowd is silent. I am thinking he HAS to be dead... free-fall from 45+ ft above and splat flat on the bottom? There is NO way he will make it... I am now yelling and trying to tell Mike what happened... they go to commercial of course! When they finally come back from commercial, he is still laying there in the same spot... they show the run and fall in slow-motion for the viewers and it is so amazing to see him... for those few seconds that he is free-falling he looks like he is trying to decide what part of this body he wants to sacrifice to that fall... and then when he does... his shoes just blew OFF his feet!! Like 2 rockets for crying out loud! Then, they flash back to his body on the ramp and all of sudden this guy stands up and walks off the ramp with help... Now I am a believer in miracles...
In the end, news reports say that all he hurt in that fall was a bruised lung, a bruised liver and a small fracture to one bone in one of his hands... Wowsers! All I can say is that guy must have a horse shoe embedded in his butt ....
In tribute of this incident and the fact that I watched it when it happened, I am attaching photos of my old board... a Powell Peralta Tony Hawk deck, Gullwing trucks and Vision Shredder wheels... those were the glory days...and never forget that skateboarding is not a crime...
And yes, I still have this board and will never part with it.
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