Report: Sue Brookes Photo: Blake Walton
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GUETTHO GAMES 2014 ttttt
AUSTRALIA - CAIRNS ttt
Ghetto Games 14 was created in only 5 days. It all started when DUP grom Alex Brookes got a brief ban from cable for being silly on their aqua park. Scotty and I knew he would drive us nuts at home, so we decided to go winching and invite everyone who wanted to come or who has never had the opportunity to winch before. In those few days, we also spoke of our good mate Brad Smeele, and how we hadn’t heard much about his recovery recently and thought we could use our winch day to raise some more support for his rehabilitaion. We set up an event page on Facebook and received an incredible amount support from riders and sponsors, who wanted to get involved. Double Up Wakeboards, DNA winches, iMend Phones and The Supply Co. Brand all came on board with donations to get us kicked off. So Scotty Green and I, spent the next few days sourcing rails, pallets, floating objects and locations. We managed to find the perfect bay on the side of Lake Kawana on the Sunshine Coast in Queensland, to hold this epic event. Scotty and our good mate Will Gorman spent nearly the whole night prior to the day, building, transporting and getting everything in the water ready for everyone to turn up and have some fun.
We had a set up a sausage sizzle and a donation box for Brad, when everyone showed up they all seemed pretty stoked and were very generous in their donations. All the groms were first to hit the water and had so much fun hitting all the obstacles, with DUP grom Alex making it look all too easy. Then the big fellas got out there getting creative, combining rails and the pallet fire cracker to step things right up. DUP crew Scotty Wilkings and Riley Lamb took things to the next level. They were definately crowd favorites. We only had one hospital visit with Jake Fowler popping out his shoulder, Lucky he is one of our own DUP boys. Scotty Greens footage of taking a face full of sand went viral very quickly and we all pretty stoked he got back up with a smile as usual. He is never shy to push winching as far as humanly possible. All round the day was a huge success, raising over $400 AUD for the www.bradsmeelefoundation.com and getting so many groms keen to winch a whole lot more. We would love to make this an annual event, bigger and better every year. Hopefully with council approval or on a private property. Although the police did come down, they were stoked and supportive of what they saw.
Rider: Alex Brookes
Photos: Hector Urzaiz Calpe Itw: Raynald Tanny
Léo
Labadens Hey Léo! It’s always nice to interview a rider like you; you always have loads of things to talk about. But first of all I would like you to tell us how you got to where you are today, how you became a pro wakeskater, how you got your pro model with REMOTE etc…
Hey Raynald! The pleasure is all mine, I wasn’t expecting to wake up to an interview this morning so I’ll try and be as clear and as precise as possible. It all started in 1996 at Sesquieres Lake; I started skating a bit and my mom and I were walking around looking for a skatepark when we stumbled accross the cable. The next morning I was trying out skis and I went on to do four years of classic water skiing until the club shut down in 2000 and Yanos took over. From then on I started wakeboarding and I discovered wakeskating thanks to Benjamin Cans, one of the drivers at the cable. He gave me so much motivation when I was younger which allowed me to persevere, I owe him everything. Then in 2005 I injured my shoulder wakeboarding and was forced to take a break so I started spending 100% of my time wakeskating. It was an awesome period of my life where I learned so much and became more and more passionate about wakeskating. Everything changed during the winter 2008/2009 when I decided to quit school and spend 6 months in the Philippines. I learned tons of stuff on pretty much everything and anything while I was over there. I had my first share house and I met Parks and the Nike 6.0 team that were over there filming for Aquafrolics. It was just incredible and I came back to France with even more motivation after having spent a fair bit of time wakeboarding again during the winter. Unfortunately I got injured again but this time it was pretty serious. My knee was a mess and it was all because of those fucking straps! That was the last straw for me and I decided to give up on the straps once and for all. 9 months went by and the reeducation was long and painful but I came back more motivated than ever to become a pro wakeskater. I’d like to point out that I’ve always loved both, but in the end, time, injuries and my love for skating gave me the urge to concentrate all my time and energy into wakeskating.
Girls SHRED By Victoria Collins
Here at Unleashed, we’re super stoked to give our first ever women’s cover to Courtney Angus as we believe she is a legit rider and an all round awesome chick. Courtney and many other girls are hitting spots that most guys wouldn’t even dream of hitting and they’re proving to everyone that women’s wakeboarding deserves a spot in this very male dominated world.
Courtney Angus - Pic: Ben Jacob - BSR - USA
Other highlights would include James Windsor going home with a 3rd place in Pro Wakeskate men (I don’t even think he was expecting it!) behind Andy Kolb and Daniel Grant (duh!). Mr Grant didn’t disappoint either, going home with a first place in the Men’s Pro category but surprisingly not making it to the finals in the Men’s Pro features, which was won by a deserving Aaron Gunn. On the ladies’ side of things, well, let’s just say a lot of guys in this world would love to “ride like a girl” if it meant throwing down like these chicks. With names like Courtney Angus, Angelika Schriber, Julia Rick and Maxine Sapulette, the show was definitely on and not only were the girls shredding on the water during their heats, but we could also see them on the pontoon, involved with the next generation of riders, giving tips and encouragement to their little protégés and pupils during the junior heats. On the result side, Julia “the machine” Rick once again showed the consistency we know and, we could almost say, was a proof of German engineering at its best! She cleaned up the podiums and went home with the two soughtafter first places in Women Pro divisions. Well folks, that’s it and if you missed it this year, you might want to seriously consider attending the next event happening in Al Forsan – stellar facilities, great times, sunshine… that’s without even talking about the massive karting track and all the luxury Abu Dhabi has to offer. One last argument: imagine how does saying casually “I’m tanned? Oh yeah, I was in Abu Dhabi last week” will sound… Pro Wakeskate 1 Grant, Daniel THA 2 Kolb, Andy GER 3 Windsor, James AUS Women’s Professional 1 Rick, Julia GER 2 Angus, Courtney 3 Sapulette, Maxine NED Pro Women’s Features 1 Rick, Julia GER 2 Angus, Courtney 3 Schriber, Ange RSA Men’s Professional 1 Grant, Daniel THA 2 Fooshee, Tom USA 3 Powell, Chandler USA Pro Men’s Features 1 Gunn, Aaron AUS 2 Powell, Chandler USA 3 Fooshee, Tom USA
James Windsor
Photo: Hectro Urzaiz Calpe
Antoine Itw: Raynald Tanny
ALLAUX Maybe one of the best french riders, and probably even one of the best European wakeboarder, Antoine Allaux is part of the nicer wakeboarders you can see ridĂŹng. Very humble, he is certainly not the one you will hear screaming loudly in party. No, where you will see him speaking the best is on the water. Fluid, clean, stylish, creative, here is his interview. Enjoy !
Have you had the chance to visit many parks overseas ? Which one would you definitely go back to? I haven’t ridden many spots overseas but the first country that comes to mind is definitely Thailand with all its cableparks. Whether its the food, the atmosphere, or the landscapes, Thailand is definitely worth it! This year I’m going to the Philippines for a change, the park looks insane I can’t wait! I’ve also been to a few different spots in the U.S and to Hipnotics. There’s a fair few decent spots close to France now too: Malamar and OCP in Espagne, and Liquid Leisure in London. Liquid Leisure is nuts, last time I was there they had 17 Unit obstacles, and more have arrived since… Who do you ride with the most? I probably ride with Cyrille Benzidane the most. He’s my boss and my sponsor (Allis Possible) and we go ride together at Cergy everyday after lunch time. We often meet up with some of the talented local kids like Yannis Duthier, Jules Charraud, or Laurent Barrois, who started not long ago and has already gotten pretty good. And this year I’m going to be able to ride with Paul Bichet again who’s just come back from a long injury. He’s a really good rider when his body works properly! Travelling also allows you to ride with heaps of different people and I think that’s super important. Is there a rider in particular that inspires you and makes you want to try out new tricks? Yeah for sure, we all inspire each other and I must admit that there’s way too many people to name just one. The reason I love going to contests is that I get to ride with heaps of people that inspire me and I only get to see them for only a few weeks every year. If my memory serves me correctly, you’ve never really been injured. What’s your secret? Wrming up? Luck? You’re made out of rubber!? Ahah I don’t know, a lot of luck I guess! I always try to warm up before going for a ride, to stretch as often as possible and to eat the right foods. You’ve been riding for Slingshot for a while now so when are we going to see you in their annual videos!? Jeff McKee, this question is for you too! hehehe Excatly, that’s a question for Jeff ahah! Jeff McKee: Well you really backed me into the corner on this one guys! Haha. We are stoked on how quickly Antoine has progressed and this summer we will be traveling to Europe to do some filming around France and Germany for one of our Auto Reply video segments. We plan to have Antoine on board with the rest of the crew to help show us around and set the lines at all the parks so we can follow him and look like we know what we are doing! Which contests will you be participating in this year? I’ll be doing the same ones as last year like FISE, Wake Of Steel, and Plastic Playground, but I don’t think I’ll be doing more than that. I want to set some time aside to travel and film more. I bet that you’ve got plenty of people to thank for your video project. These next lines are for you. I’d like to start by thanking Unleashed for this interview. A HUGE thank you goes out to Cyrille Benzidane who pushes me and helps me do what I want through Allis Possible. My other sponsors Kanar for Slingshot, Mystic, Vinny from Corner Shop. We didn’t even have 5 minutes thank any one in the video so I’d like to take this opportunity to thank Rémy Carillon who invested a lot of his time into this project, as well as Yannick. The team at TND which included Cédric, Ben, Guigui, JM and Rose as well as Hugo, Salim, Boubou, Roman, Vincent, Yannis, Jules, Marc, Joss, Ludo, Jason, and every other person who gave us a hand to carry, cut, drill, sand etc… Thanks to everyone who’s been there for me over the years, its a heartwarming feeling to have such amazing support.
Photo: Roman Lassus
Photos: Jobe Wakeboards Interview: Raynald Tanny Spot: TNG - France
Julian
Cohen When you think cable, there are some riders that come immediately to your mind. Julian Cohen is part of those. Versatile, creative, very technique and clean, motivated, Julian imposed itself on contests, but also on the web with his videos. Even if his brother Yonel seems to catch him, it is clear that julian is still holding the distance... This month, we give him some pages to express themselves. Happy reading!
Christian Deltell - Doublewake - Spain - Photo: Hector Urzaiz Calpe
James Windsor - TWP - Thailand - Photo: Philippe Sirech
Daniel Grant - RWP - Philippines - Photo: Derry Malloy