9. Conor Champion – “YOUGOTTAGETTHAT”

Regular sufferers of this blog-site will know that there are a number of cheap ways to win favor around here, and using Petey Pablo’s 2001 anthem “Raise Up” definitely is one. Conor Champion scores extra super major points for having a sweet alliterative name and demonstrating full commitment to smith and feeble grinds. I could go on about hopping out of switch b/s tails or the proper spin on the 360 flips or various other aspects of the fantastic skating in this part, but maybe would just mention that the line at night that starts with the fakie flip up the curb, with the briefest flash of a classical navy/white DC sticker, did more to revive long-faded feelings for that company than much else these past few years (with the possible exception of Josh Kalis’ recent 360 flip ad).

Backmasking

Back it up then stop

There are those dudes like Brian Wenning and Daniel Castillo and Nate Jones who find a seam to mine and stick with it for much of their careers, and when you’ve got a nice switch heelflip/switch backside heelflip/hair that can help you pay your mortgage or whatever, more power to you. But for those of us whose major fulfillment re: progression comes from landing personal NDB’s, by a function of stair-fearing ankles or general sucking, it’s heartening to see established pro-bros who keep reaching for the new-trick rainbow year in and year out.

Case in point: Emmanuel Guzman’s rather genuine excitement at filming a flatground switch 360 flip in the Transworld video, a maneuver he apparently had figured out not long before. This particular memory was jogged via Guzman’s section in “Prevent This Tragedy” when he twirls a switch tre over a cement hump, only to follow it with what I’m assuming is another recent addition to the repertoire, a switch backside 360.

Now, there was a time and place when backside noseblunting a handrail won you fever points with the masses, covers of magazines, curtains in videos; this time was the year 2000 and the place was a little zone that so-cal brahs like to call “so-cal, brah.” The handrail BSNBS was among the last milemarker tricks, in that it became over the subsequent years kind of a benchmark as far as what dudes could do it and how big they could take it.

It seems like a lot of the past decade was given over to stringing tricks together and rediscovering ramp roots, but if there were to be ’10 version of the barometer type trick, we at Boil the ocean internet peanut gallery LLC would gently submit the switch backside 360 as a worthwhile candidate. Suitably exclusive to the super-good, it’s also one that could conceivably be done ugly enough to let you sort out the legit envelope-pushers from the skatepark stair pretenders. Guzman doesn’t sail his down a Merlino-sized gap but it’s got an interesting delay to it. And yeah we are aware that Russ Milligan has already done and gone and did it with a kickflip (who else–Chris Cole? PJ Ladd?)

Guzman’s got that wicked spider-style and the switch 360 actually ranks pretty low on the gnarlitude scale when it comes to his part in this video, with higher positions held by the frontside ollie into the giant pool, the windbreaker hill jam and a personal favorite, the backside tailslide (to regulars) on the wood rail, which anyone will tell you earns extra points always.

Bobby Worrest: Time to Die

Bobby Worrest had buddies who died face-down in the muck so that you and I can enjoy this internet blog website

Not so long ago, I went a-shopping and came up on a copy of the old PitCrew video “Where I’m From” being offered for the princely sum of $5, so I figured, what the fuck–pretty awesome DC effort with parts from Jake Rupp and Darren Harper, not as good as “Pack a Lunch,” but what is. What hit me most about this vid was that Bobby Worrest was in full-on snotnosed fashion, a skinny little kickflippin’ handrailin’ SOB that I barely recognized, accustomed as I am to the macrobrew-swilling tattoo merchant nowadays beloved by the Gonz and strippers alike. It was sort of like wandering into the corner bar in your hometown and seeing the little neighbor kid all puffed up and red-faced, nursing a tequila sunrise, except if you were in the nation’s capital and possessed a functional time machine along with some flannel.

The modern day Bobby Worrest has many advantages. He can dress. You know, he’s got that tech ability but there’s restraint too, when you talk about taking the switch 360 flip to noseslide back to regular. The dude has an eye for overlooked ledge tricks (b/s 180 to switch k-grind), skates at night a lot and has balls enough to do a fakie hardflip on flat, and not even the Bryan Herman-approved kind of hardflip which is all the rage these days. Old(er) school rap is becoming kind of a safe move for skate parts these last couple years but it’s a good look here as there’s a lot of actual street skating in this part, by which we mean longer lines than you’d normally see, which stray beyond the generally accepted format of b/s tailslide 270 shove-it, nollie 360 flip, front blunt bigspin or whatever the Forecast generation’s version of the b/s tail-nollie flip-nosegrind 411 line may be.

Sort of like Silas Baxter Neal, probably Bobby Worrest is at some point in his career where he can keep cranking out parts like this and be good for years, as long as he stays away from those chicken-scratcher grinds on banks. It’s hard to guess at what his ultimate motivation might be. If it’s strippers and beer and weed then his longevity may be secure, as it seems to have worked wonders for Fred Gall, who is rich and famed and well-beloved, in addition to being from New Jersey. Hopefully Worrest’s sponsors will steer his career around stereotype potholes filled with Coors Light and Rambo and shit, but God knows it’s a tough economy out there.