Old School Skate Jam II - Once Is Never Enough

 By Brian Brannon

The second gathering of the old schoolers of legend and lore went down February 9th at Skatelab in Simi Valley. Once again the main event of the Old School Skate Jam was held in the medium deep wooden bowl and once again the snake session was a gnarly as those assembled. When you mix so much talent, so much energy and so many hungry skaters and toss them like a salad in a wooden bowl, there is gonna be some heated action, there are gonna be some near misses and there are gonna be some sick collisions.

In the near misses department, Duane Peters took the cake, though there were many others getting a slice of that same baked good. Duane also threw down some of his trademark gnarldog moves like his patented backside layback tailslide revert and hyper-extended layback rollouts to name but a few. DP's old teammate rival from the early Hobie days, Eddie "El Gato" Elguera was there as well, throwing down sweet frontside rocks and his own signature move the Elguerial. Of course, as soon as Mad Dog Tony Alva showed up, he was taking every third run whether anybody else liked it or not. And TA was flowing on a lengthy stick with lapped over grinders, backside disasters and the move he trademarked, the tuck-knee frontside air.

Screamin' Lord Salba was slicing and dicing the bowl every which way, bringing to mind his old nickname, "Le Machine." Salbdogger flowed solid frontside and backside airs over the hip like nobody's business. Caster team smoothy Tom "Wally" Inouye of Inouye's Pool Service was ripping in style, throwing down his famous cross-step carve grinds where he puts his back foot on the nose at the top of a backside carve. Inouye was rolling high until a percussive skull bongo laid him flat on the flatbottom for a couple of moments and everybody who wasn't wearing one took time to put on their helmets.

If you want to talk about speed, let's talk about Eddie Reatugui. The Edster was clocking about Mach five around the bowl and barely slowing down as he blazed rock and roll slides through the corners. Then of course there was Dave Reul kicking it out on frontside stinkers, Pat Ngoho ripping it on a long one and even Arizona homeboy Todd Joseph throwing his signature TJ layback air like a champ.

Faces in the crowd that night included Wes Humpston, Jim Muir, Ben Schroeder, Stacy Peralta, Stevie Caballero, Jeff Ho, Skip Englbom, Dave Andrecht, Stevie Dread, Mike Folmer, George Wilson, Ed Economy, Dave hackett, Doug "Pineapple" Saladino, Darrel Delgado, Jeff Grosso, John Lucero, Kevin Thatcher and Eric Dressen. There were many, many more names of yore, but after a few brews, that's all you're gonna get for now.

The Old School Skate Jam looks like it's becoming a yearly event, and it should, because it gives all the rippers from way back when a chance to get together away from the hype a technical flippery of modern skateboarding. Besides, most of these guys are still skating to this day, proving that true skaters never die, they just get smoother with age. Big thanks to Todd of Skatelab for having the vision and wherewithal to make this dream session a reality.

To check out more go to www.oldschoolskatejam.com