Buster Harterman at the 2006 Paris LG Action Sports World Tour. © ASA
Skate in the Shadows of the Eiffel Tower
Sep 06 2006 / Los Angeles, CA
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Another weekend ends, and another stop on the LG Action Sports World Tour comes to a close. Boy do those Parisians love their action sports. Who wouldn’t, with the Eiffel Tower looming over head, it’s an amazing scene. This is definitely as romantic as action sports get!
The exotic location brought out a field of heavy-hitters including BMX riders Simon Tabron, Dave Dillewaard, Zack Shaw, and Tom Haugen, Skateboarders Anthony Furlong, Jake Brown, Mathias Ringstrom, and local boy Jean Postec, along with Inline Skaters Shane Yost, Takeshi Yasutoko, and local legend Täig Khris. Each field was stacked with big names, along with the usual local flavor brought out by the World Tour. With athletes from Japan, England, Argentina, Australia, Italy, Finland, Brazil, Germany, and the US, this was truly a global competition.
The BMX events were full of repeats from last weekend in Berlin. Simon Tabron and good friend Zack Shaw brought the one and two spots in vert back to the UK once again, in their usual stylish fashion. Funny how Zack even makes those hang ups look nice, isn’t it? The third spot went to Jay Eggleston, who’s airs peaked right around the top of the tower (okay, almost), followed by Tom Haugen in fourth, and Mike Mancuso in fifth. Over on the park course, another repeat was taking place as Dave Dillewaard chalked up another win for Australia. Dave makes everything look so effortless that sometimes it’s easy to forget he’s absolutely killing it on the course. In second was Alesandro Barbero, the Italian rider who’s been making a name for himself in the last year. If I’m not mistaken Alex just earned himself a spot at this year’s Championships. English powerhouses Chris Mahoney and Ben Hennon took third and fourth respectively. It’s always a treat to see Corey Martinez ride, With Corey you’re always going to see something original, and those original lines took him into fifth place. First Osato turns up in Berlin, now Corey Martinez turns up in Paris… wow.
The Inline vert contest saw Mark Englehart qualifying in the top spot, but when it came to the finals, Mark could only muster a fifth place in Paris. Takeshi Yasutoko and Shane Yost have been going back and forth, battling it out at the last few events. If you’ve paid any attention to inline over the past four years, you’ll know that anyone competing on the level of the Yasutoko brother’s is nothing short of remarkable. They’ve dominated every event, but Shane has been working hard this year, and it shows. Shane managed to win both the Birmingham and Paris stops of the tour, but this time around the high flying Takeshi Yasutoko took the win, with Shane in a very respectable second. Hey, when the Yasutoko’s are on, they’re on. Third place went to the local favorite, Täig Khris, followed by Holland’s Sven Boekhorst.
Skateboard vert had everyone wondering if Juergen Horrwarth could repeat his victory from last weekend, or if first place qualifier Anthony Furlong was going to steal the win from him. The clear local favorite was Frenchman Jean Postec, who recently moved to Southern California, and has been on a contest rampage of late. Horrwarth was able to pull off a respectable fifth place finish while Furlong dropped down to fourth. The curse of the first place qualifying spot had reared its ugly head again. Jean Postec was able to make his local fans proud with his third place finish. Jean has some big tricks and a great style… you’ll hear a lot about this guy from now on, I promise. Third place wasn’t going to be quite good enough for the French, however. They sent out another local boy, Terence Bougdour, to collect on the second place spot. A French revolution is hitting skateboarding for sure. In first place we had the ever-stylish Mathias Rinstrom. Mathias takes every variation and tweaks it just a bit further than humanly possible. He’s been due for a win for some time now, and Paris was his.
Our last stop was Skateboard park were we saw four Frenchmen in the top ten, but the best they could do was Mark Haziza’s fifth place finish. Fourth went to the UK’s Ross McGouren, while third went to the German vert ripper, Juergen Horrwarth... yup he skates park too. Second place went to the UK’s Chris Oliver, while the top spot was all Tobias Albert’s. Tobias is from Munich and was a full six points ahead of his closest competition. His back to back tricks, and use of the whole course, combined with big tricks like his Japan air over the funbox gave Tobias the highest scores of the day.
Topping the location of the Paris event isn’t going to be easy. The tour must go on, though. The LG Action Sports World Championships take place in Dallas in October, and the event is sure to be a treat. You can expect the biggest names and best riders from the tour to all be going head to head in the land of the Cowboys. See you there.
- Jared Souney
