Shredzilla Kills Visalia California
…the streets of down town Visalia were blocked off and people were skating everywhere. There was a car, a tow truck and a bunch of little street obstacles all over; reminded me of the old “Sacto” street contest form Future Primitive
Shredzilla Kills Visalia California 4/17/2005
Words and photos: Rene Morales
So I get this call in early March from my friend Joey at Paying in Pain Magazine. He tells me he is putting together an “Old School” street contest and skate jam in his home town of Visalia, California. I tell him I’m in and will send some stuff his way to give out. After thinking about it, we both decided it would be rad to have a launch ramp contest. I offered to judge it so I knew a Visalia road trip would be in order. Great excuse to get out of the house for a few days and skate. I called Joe (papa smurf) Rios to get in contact with some of the team riders at set the wheels in motion. At first only Brant Austin and Hippie Shannon were coming out. By the end of the month Art Miranda, Mike Hamerla, and Dirty Dave Allred had signed on. 7 man crew off to Central California.
Saturday morning couldn’t come quick enough. We all met at my house around 7:30am, loaded up the cars, grabbed the beers and vicodins and were out the door. A stop in Delano proved fruitful. The Delano Skatepark is in the middle of this tiny farm town across from the local high school. When we arrived the park was closed and locked up tight. Luckily one of the local kids new the number to parks and recs. After a short conversation with the park dude, he was on his way to open up. The park is sick; I mean it’s just really good. No pool coping, but mad lines and deep. Even with my fucked up knee I was still able to cruise around and have a good time. Everyone was killing it! Hamerla blasted a head high f/s air, Art was killing the coping with mad lip tricks (the kids were screaming and tripping out). Brant was all over that park with Madonna to tails and huge ollie airs. Dirty Dave did his thing and never stopped. No pads, no cops and god times. Back on I-5 and we were there. Hotel looked decent and mellow. We bullshited the hotel clerk and said we only had two per room to keep them from charging us for more heads. The pool was a sick kidney that had water, yet you could tell that thing had been skated at one time. Grind marks all over the coping. We checked in our shit, drank more beers and hit the Visalia Park.
The Visalia Park is strange. No trannny really just a lot of banks that curve around and one tiny snake run that leads to a tiny bowl. However, despite its appearance it’s a lot of fun and crazy shit can still go down in there. Art Miranda launched over the fence gap with a 7 foot high grabber air. Some local kid said the only other person he had ever seen do that was Jesse Paez. After all that we decided to go back to the room and then go find a bar. We started drinking around 6pm and I don’t think we ever stopped. I woke up Sunday morning still trying to figure out what happened.
Sunday morning, time to get our asses up for the skate jam/contest. To our surprise the streets of down town Visalia were blocked off and people were skating everywhere. There was a car, a tow truck and a bunch of little street obstacles all over; reminded me of the old “Sacto” street contest form Future Primitive. As the day progressed more shit went down. Sacrifice,the dudes from Bacon Skates, Heathen Clothing and Nobody Skateboards all kicked down stuff for the kiddies. Not to mention the Bud girls were there!!! We skated a while, Art was blasting huge airs as usual and we were all hung over. I gave $100 bucks to some local kid who was just killing the launch ramp with six foot high kick flips and ollie airs. Honorable mention goes to Misha for the three-sixty Judo airs! All in all it was a great time and a killer event. Big props to Joey from Paying in Pain for making it all happen. You really had to be there to see how much fun it really was. Oh yeah, the vatos from Bacon Skateboards are some hesh muther fuckers that rip. Go buy their shit and support true independent skateboarders! See you next year if it happens again. Nate Malo, heal quickly there are more pools for you to kill! Heathen Clothing coming up strong in 05. Don’t drink and drive…just ask Hamerla. Too many vicodins kill you stomach, but they get you high!!