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Kevin Jones made his usual brief appearance (blink and you'll miss him), doing some hang-5s in the parking lot and whiplashes down the hill; then it was back to wherever he goes to avoid the limelight. Jarhead was shooting for Ride (which resulted in flatland pics will ending up in the magazine — woo-hoo!), Large Ray was roaming, Mike Daily was shooting photos, and TV semi-celeb Kenan Harkin was taping for some show and driving around in a butt-ugly Pontiac Aztek. Kenan also brought out a box jump, which is not a normal sight for a York Jam...
But back to the flatland. Despite a lot of riders in attendance, there wasn't a crapload of riding going on. I, for one, get rather nervous riding in front of (or, in this case, with) a lot of people, and I know I'm not the only one. There's also the intimidation factor: riding alongside some of flatland's pros can kinda get to you (don't let him fool you: Leif Valen is one intimidating sonofabitch). It's all mental, I know, but I think it affected more people than just me. Ridiculous as it may sound, but I think flatlanders like to be alone (or at least in smaller groups). But riding jitters aside, it's awesome to see people I rarely see, as well as meet new people (some of whom, I was happy to hear, actually read eWire).
There were several riders who were tearing things up, but no doubt it was the Japanese riders who really impressed everyone, particularly Morisaki Hiroya and Takahiro "Eno-yang" Enoki. I normally don't like trying to describe flatland tricks, but the stuff they were doing is worth an attempt. Hiroya had the most amazing string: halfhiker to half-barspin kickflip to cross-footed forward karl kruzer, into a cross-footed halfhiker flipped cleanly into a halfpacker, then flipped directly into a two-footed wheelchair. Eno-yang was doing a lot of the new-style cross-handed steamroller / opposite-spinning circle-K / spastic tomahawk stuff, totally brakeless and — more importantly — in control. Not to mention the aggressive style he had, which made his stuff look that much more impressive.
The police showed up a couple times during the day, but we never got kicked out like last time, although John Cote matched the description of a robbery suspect they were looking for (no arrests were made). When dark came, we hit Wendy's for dinner, scored a hotel room, then returned for the 11:00 showing of the new Dorkin' in York video.
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