Goofy VS Regular - Etnies Skateboard Contest - Skatepark of Lake Forest

The fifth annual etnies GvR skateboarding contest was held October 2-5, 2008 at the etnies Skatepark of Lake Forest. For those of you who didn't know, the series was tied up before the contest started. If you don’t know what GvR is all about, then let me give you the quick break down: This is the 5th Annual. Who knows if it will continue from here, but the bottom line is that Regular has won twice and Goofy has won twice. That means this could be the eternal tie-breaker on which stance is truly dominant. Funny to think about, right? Does anyone really care? I’ll tell you what…a lot of people that are hanging around Sole Technology (parent company of eS, etnies, and Emerica) care, and overall, it’s really an entertaining concept. These are results and photos of the street portion of the contest only.

Lets back up a second and explain the difference between goofy footed and regular footed for those of you that don't know. The difference is the stance you use when participating in boardsports such as skateboarding, surfing, wakeboarding and snowboarding. Most of the time people find one of these positions more natural than the other. Goofy footed riders use their right foot as their leading foot and regular footed riders use their left foot as their leading foot just like in the picture above.

So back to the Contest…it’s basically a team vs. team challenge, with the teams being those that are regular-stance and those that are goofy-stance. Think about your favorite pros and top ams and which way they skate and you can figure out the teams. Pretty simple, right?

You know that it pretty much never rains in Southern California, but of course it rained on Saturday during the Qualifiers. That meant that the rest of the Qualifiers got handled before the Semi-Finals on Sunday afternoon. With all the qualifiers out of the way it was time for the main event, The Finals.

The skaters were broken down into five-man heats according to their stance. There would be a heat of Regular, then a heat of Goofy, then back to the Regulars. In the Semis they had four heats total, two for each stance. Then they took the top dudes out of the Semis and put them in with the “chosen ones” from each stance…they guys that were picked ahead of time to represent either Goofy or Regular in the Finals.

Skating for the regular footed tem we had Malto, Reynolds, Cole, Sheckler, and McCrank. And the top five for the Goofy footers, it just didn’t seem to match up with Rogers, Hendley, Caswell, Olson, and Darrell representing. No offense to those dudes because they’re all rad skateboarders, but I just thought that the Regular line-up was better. But then I got a bit nervous when I heard that both Andrew Reynolds and Ryan Sheckler were “sick.” I don’t know about that because I saw Ryan Sheckler in the crowd.

Okay, so we get through four more heats of Finals, two for each stance, and the skating was literally off the hook. It was very hard to predict which way the contest was going to go because the hammers were flying! In the end the contest was to close to score so the officials decided the best thing to do would be to play a Game of SKATE on the chosen obstacle, which happened to be the big double-set with a step-up and good-sized hubbas on each side.

It was Chris Cole and Andrew Langi skateboarding for the regulars and Tyler Hendley and Justin Figueroa for the Goofy footers. This was literally the best Game of SKATE that I’ve ever seen. Goofy came up and got a couple of letters on Regular, but then Cole got strategic. The best part was Chris Cole getting Figgy on old school tricks like the fs 180 air and nosegrab judo up the step-up. As gnarly as Figgy is, his attempts were literally pathetic…it was obvious that he had never even thought of trying those tricks before. Goofy had a chance to make a comeback, but it didn’t happen because Cole can do every single trick in the world. Cole ended it with a switch fs flip and bs 360 ollie into the step-up. Tyler and Figgy gave solid tries respectively, but just couldn’t hang.

In the end it was the Regular footers that came out on top and the score is now Regulars 3 and Goofy 2. I sure hope they decide to put this contest on again because it is th best pro skateboard competition to take place in Southern California in a skatepark. What you say? Yes. Southern California actually has been building a few decent skateparks over the past few years and the Etnies Skatepark of Lake Forest is one of them and is set up with everything you need to put on a great skateboard contest.

Sean Malto - Backside Lipslide on the Zumiez Couch rail

1st - Chris Cole - $16,000 – at the risk of kissing way too much Chris Cole ass, I’m saying that he is currently the best skateboarder alive. If he puts his mind to it, I don’t think that there is anything he can’t do. That’s why he was the Regular MVP, too
2nd - Andrew Langi - $10,000 – what is this kid going to do with 10 G’s? I don’t know what to say and I’ve said this before I guess, but Langi is going to be a force to be reckoned with in the very near future. He’s skating on a pro level
3rd - Julian Christianson - $6,000 – who are you? Where did you come from? With the exception of the bs 180 bennihana, this kid had quite a bag of tricks. Someone will be picking him up shortly
4th - Carlos de Andrade - $3,500 – where you been, Son? Carlos still has it, with HUGE fs ollies on the quarterpipe and backside flips over the whole couch
5th - Chris Troy - $3,500 – I think that Troy was a bit nervous that he got picked for the Final squad, but he held his own with proper 360 flips down the big stairs and fs boardslides 270 out on the rails
6th - David Loy - $1,000 – my boy
7th - Fabrizio Santos - $1,000 – new nickname courtesy of Duncan: Fabreezy
8th - Rick McCrank - $2,000 – note: If you were picked to be in the Finals, you got an extra G. That’s why McCrank in 8th has $2,000 and 7th has $1,000
9th - Kurtis Colamonico - $1,000 – gangsta’
10th - Austen Seaholm - $1,000 – Yea Austen was ripping, no surprise there!
11th - Sean Malto - $2,000 – Lil’ Koston
12th - Stevie Reeves - $1,000 – wild man
13th - Chris Mendes - $1,000 – some people say he’s weird
14th - Adam Dyet - $1,000 – claimed to get ripped off again
15th - Danny Rosario - $1,000 – Father, Son, and Holy Ghost before each trick

1st - Tyler Hendley - $2,000 – they call him “White Chocolate.” Damn that’s a funny nickname, but don’t let it fool you because Tyler knows how to throw the f*#k down when the time comes. He did 360 flips and nollie biggies higher than anyone there and was damn close to leading the Goofs to victory and himself to MVP
2nd - Jereme Rogers - $2,000 – the best was Jereme claiming that “Cole cheated” because he did some old school tricks to take the Game of SKATE. Sounds like someone need to learn ollie grabs
3rd - Justin Figueroa - $1,000 – Figgy is already a top am and is on his way to being a top pro in the next couple of years. He’s got a HUGE bag of tricks, but now we just need him to learn how to grab his board…ha
4th - Rodolfo Ramos - $1,000 – someone said to me, “It’s amazing how much control he has over those 180 fs ollies to switch krooks.” It really is…he locks them in so good and solid it’s like a regular krooked grind
5th - Chad Bartie - $1,000 – ATV Aussie ripper ain’t scared to jump down big stuff. Even though he was 10 years older than the rest of the Goofy skaters he still did a bluntslide down the big hubba and a heelflip down the big stairs
6th - Caswell Berry - $2,000 – stoked to see him in a contest
7th - Brandon Westgate - $1,000 – super impressive
8th - Darrell Stanton - $2,000 – class act
9th - Taylor Smith - $1,000 – on the come up
10th - Alex Olson - $2,000 – best style ever
11th - Felipe Gustavo - $1,000 – kf fs krooks on lock
12th - Tom Fynn - $1,000 – doesn’t look Australian
13th - Morgan Smith - $1,000 – ripped the whole time, but maybe got overlooked
14th - Kevin Romar - $1,000 – can’t remember much, but he’s a smooth operator
15th - Helder Lima - $1,000 – Euro