More on ASR and King of the Road later. For now, the relevant details:


Alex Mizurov won the amateur Game of SKATE contest at ASR. The contest, set up like the basketball game HORSE, is actually a pretty excellent way to run a skate contest: pitting skaters head to head in a flatland trick showdown reminiscent of the way many skaters learn tricks, entertain themselves when there's nothing cool to skate, and challenge themselves against their buddies. It drags out all day when there are a lot of skaters in the brackets, but at something like ASR where you get to the point where you'd do anything to take a break from hucksterism and just sit and watch some good skating, that works out just about right.


Mizurov won it here in San Diego last year. This time he beat out Andrew Smith for the win. Carlos Casta took 3rd, and 13-year-old whippersnapper Matt Lemond took 4th.In the invite-only pro contest, the first big showdown I saw was between Nyjah Huston and Sierra Fellers. Nothing against Huston, but I was rooting for Fellers to win the whole shebang. Actually, after Huston beat his ass in round one, I changed allegiance and started rooting for the dreadlocked kid instead. And... what do you know? He made it all the way to the bitter end, ultimately losing out to Chris Cole.


Chris Cole, X Games extraordinaire and all around awesome skater, could be found all day long working on huge tricks off to the side of where the contest was being held, and by the time I found him there had amassed his own crowd of people more interested in watching him practice than in seeing other guys compete. Here's how he took it: kickflip backside 360, about chest high on young Nyjah, who did his damnedest with a switch varial flip body varial and all kinds of craziness. Next year, Nyjah, next year. Mike Mo Capaldi and Javier Sarmiento rounded out the top 4.


In other news... I made it out to the tough-to-get-into Thrasher King of the Road party at House of Blues, thanks to some ticket help from good people at Zoo York, Foundation, and Black Label (I needed three tickets). Blind wouldn't give me one, so I was really rooting against them. Damn.

1. Blind (MVP went to Jake Duncombe, he of the 16-foot gap ollie extolled here a few days ago)

2. Foundation

3. Black Label

4. Zoo York.


My battery is about to die and I have to catch a plane, so here's the best comment from the Thrasher site to sum up this news:


"blind came outta nowhere. label coulda had it if they gave a sh!t. and zoo york doesnt have enough dirtbags to get any points on KOTR. foundation had it set for second, though."


My sentiments exactly.

Stay tuned: I took pictures of all kinds of crappy skate-related toys at ASR and will post a kook gallery tonight.