Ultrabowl 6 – 2014 Sweden
Photos by Ramin Golmohammadi and Björn Handell
As skateboarding continues to grow globally, countries should look to Sweden as a guideline for how to authentically grow and represent the sport. The Swedish city of Malmö reflects a respectable harmony between skate and state. It is not uncommon to see perfect ledges lined with angle iron and DIY spots littered throughout the city. These unrestricted playgrounds for traveling and local skaters are supported by the city and maintained by the locals.
The annual Ultrabowl event is a microcosm of Sweden’s genuine support of skateboarding. Each year, the city of Malmö sets aside nearly $300,000 to throw a bowl event that hosts over 100 Pro, Am and Female skaters from around the world. They help many athletes with travel and accommodations and throw the event during Malmö Festival, a week-long celebration of the city.
Leading up to Ultrabowl 6, the entire surface of the nearly 10,000 sq ft. Flow bowl at Stapelbäddsparken was sanded down and polished to make the bowl smoother and faster. The old hand-made pool coping was also replaced by premier Viking block coping. These changes opened up new speed lines and lip trick possibilities for Ultrabowl 6.
The three-day event consisted of three divisions, the Juniors (16 & under), the Pro/Am and the Get Set Go! Girls’ competition. On Friday, the international pool of skaters fought for one of the 8 spots open in Saturday’s Quarter-Finals. The judges had to make some tough calls on which Pro/Ams and Juniors made it into the contest after a packed series of heats.
Since the forecast called for rain on Sunday (finals day), the Saturday schedule was changed to include both the Quarter and Semi Finals for every division. Although this made for an incredibly packed day, it allowed the judges to be left with solid results that they would be able to depend on if finals were to be canceled.
The Get Set Go! portion of the competition is the women’s division that takes place in the back section of Stapelbäddsparken. The section is reminiscent of a miniature Washington Street including street features that allow many different levels and approaches to skating to shine. The local Tösabidarna crew dedicated to supporting women’s skateboarding has done a great job of growing the event to entice dozens of girls with various skate styles from all over the world to compete. UK native Lois Pendlebury was certainly a stylish standout in the competition with her hurricanes and indy transfers. I had a great time doing blunt to fakies on the strange bowling ball that they used as a part of the spine coping. Local Mimmi Leckius not only threw perfect inverts and layback airs to tail, she even invented the “Monkey Pizza,” which is reminiscent of a layback air with a varial. The other local, Emma Fastesson Lindgren knows the tricky course like the back of her hand. She was the only one to use each nook and cranny efficiently and flow through the course with a trick on every wall. Some of her tricks included: alley oop 270s over the street hip, tailslides on the bank to curb, feeble to smiths over the spine, bs smiths and fun no comply front shuvs on the bank.
2012 Get Set Go! Winner Julia Bruckler from Austria brought a technical approach. She went from 5-0 to fakies to switch blunts, took her bowl-to-bowl transfers into 5-0s and tailslides and popped beautiful kickflips and backside flips on the bank and funbox.
Alana Smith took the whole event to another level. The funny thing is that she was really just warming up for her runs in the Junior division. She threw tre flips, switch front rocks, double kiclflip rock to fakies and even treflip rock to fakies. She was giggling and smiling the whole time. Alana then immediately ran over to her heat in the Junior division and popped big airs and blunt to fakies in the deep end.
Although the juniors were all under 16, the division delivered an array of progressive, innovative and powerful skateboarding. The most creative skater of the weekend, Ludvig Hakansson made it through to the semi-finals of the competitive junior division. This Swedish ripper was full of footplant-finger flip variations that reflected a fun care-free approach to skating. A stand out trick for Ludvig was one where he launched off of the love seat onto the top of the big bank, did a catwalk on the edge to a finger flip to tail and then early grabbed back into the love seat transition. Jonas Bunger from Germany also threw in some creativity with an elusive bennihana over a hip and quick ollie/wallie over the loveseat. Tyler Edtmayer from Germany was another one to watch in this division. His rapid rate of progression allowed him to bring 540s and gay twists to the contest even as he was chasing Keegan Palmer around the park. Being in a heat with Keegan meant always sharing the bowl. The young Australian ripper rarely fell, never needed to rest and started the heat with a stalefish 540. Keegan also front rock slid, lipslid and ollied up onto the extensions where the height of the vert alone were taller than he is. His fast, flowy lines were riddled with bluntslides, eggplants and ollie norths galore. Local Kalle Berglind was nipping at Keegan’s heels with incredibly speedy lines like no other. He boosted huge bonelesses, stylishly grabbed his indy rail on back smiths, took his frontside airs to revert and used every inch of the park. Kalle had the potential to keep up with Keegan but a mispump threw him into an unfortunate slam onto his wrist. Kalle had to take a little time to recover and then had a little trouble trying to throw in the rest of his hammers right before the buzzer.
The pro division was a non-stop representation of the progression of transition skating. Each heat of the semi-finals felt like a final full of back-to-back bangers. Judging this division was no easy task. Any skater in the semis belonged in the final. However, tough cuts had to be made. Even Josh Rodriguez landed 13th after pulling burntwists, front lip reverts through corners and front blunts. Rodriguez came out of the gate with the most stylish front rock slide over the love seat on the bank: He tucked his knees and grazed the concrete with his fingertips as though the bank was a wave. Cody Lockwood pulled some of the best tricks of the entire weekend. Early in his heat, Lockwood threw a sal flip nose blunt and a front blunt disaster on the monster bank. At the very end, Lockwood gave Ultrabowl an incredible, last-second, history-making trick: a backside flip lipslide revert through the deep corner. The crowd lost their minds and Lockwood flew into Russel as he was rolling away. The camaraderie of skateboarding shone through this moment as Lockwood and Russell helped each other up with huge smiles on their faces as tons of skaters poured into the flat bottom to congratulate Lockwood on his amazing make. Despite his incredible trickery, Lockwood was not consistent enough to have made the cut into finals. However, Ultrabowl is forever grateful for his creation of a moment we will never forget. Despite his crash with Lockwood, Russell had an amazing heat and whipped fearlessly though the park whether there were other skaters in his path or not. Russell threw everything to revert from airs to frontside inverts. When he wasn’t reverting, he was dropping huge airs and bonelesses to disaster. He even front hurricaned over the loveseat on the bank. Corey Juneau skated well on his first trip to Malmo, not only did he make it in qualifiers but he ended up placing well. Corey flowed through the whole park with speed and fierce lines, dropping nosegrinds and fs smith fs rocks on the big bank. Alex Sorgente was on fire and had come to Malmo with a ton of wins under his belt. He pulled flawless saran wraps, half-cab blunts to cab disasters, and perfect Caballerials. However, Sorgente’s precision couldn’t shake local boy Oskar Rozenberg Hallberg’s lines. Oski floated 270s over the hip, took a wild line into a wallride on the bank and then wallied into the loveaseat, ollied up to a fs 5-0 on an enormous vert wall and casually pulled it to fakie, gracefully alley-ooped his way over the love seat, bs noseblunted the bank and kept skating well after the buzzer. Oski was a flowing machine.
The Ultrabowl is an amazing way to bring the global community of skateboarding together. Each year, John Magnusson and the locals of Malmo really go out of their way to make it special for every skater. Contests like Ultrabowl are a great reminder of how blessed we all are to be skateboarders. Thank you, Malmo and everyone who made the contest happen!
Get Set Go! results 2014
1. Alana Smith (US)
2. Julia Brückler (AUT)
3. Emma Fastesson Lindgren (SWE)
4. Mimmi Leckius (SWE)
5. Amelia Brodka (US)
6. Lois Pendlebury (UK)
7. Sarah Meurle (SWE)
8. Helena Long (UK)
9. Tonje Pedersen (NOR)
10. Mary Dabbadie (FRA)
11. Katta Sterner (SWE)
12. Johanna Juzelius (SWE)
13-28 No specific order Stefani Nurding (UK), Ninni Perraud (NOR), Tina Heikkilä (FIN), Irma Holst (SWE), Rianne Evans (UK), Katja Uneborg (SWE), Frida Åberg (SWE), Sarah Thorén (SWE), Sonia Sciebura (SWE), Claire Jones (UK), Jessica Jansson (SWE), Nicoline Egeberg Jeppesen (DK), Emelie Souza (BRA), Nina Troëng (SWE), Dania Salih (SWE), Emma Bernström (SWE)
Pro/AM results:
1 KEEGAN PALMER 84
2 KALLE BERGLIND 82
3 OSVALD HARRYSSON 78
4 TYLER EDTMAYER 73
5 HERMAN MÖLLER 71
6 HUGO BOSERUP 69
7 ALANA SMITH 60
8 SIMON SAL 58
9 LUDVIG HÅKANSSON 56
10 MARKUS LINK 54
11 JONAS BÜNGER 53
12 ALESSANDRO MAZZARA 52
13 GABRIEL VIKING 51
14 LEON RÜB 46
15 AXEL KÄLLMEN 43
16 CARLOS THÖRNBERG 40
17 JAKOB KRISTOFFERISCH 39
18 WILLIAM PERSSON 38
19 LUDWIG LILJA 37
20 MILO WADSTRÖM 36
21 FINNIAN ROCILLO-MARTIN 30
22 CARL ÅSTRÖM 29
23 FELIX KÖPPE 29
24 NILS CERVIN 23
PRO RESULTS
1 OSKAR ROZENBERG HALLBERG 90
2 ALEX SORGENTE 85
3 CHRIS RUSSELL 83
4 CORY JUNEAU 82
5 BJÖRN LILLESOE 80
6 MURILO PEREZ 79
7 DALTON DERN 77
8 DANNY LEON 77
9 CODY LOCKWOOD 76
10 JOSH BORDEN 75
11 NICK PETERSEN 75
12 SIMON KARLSSON 72
13 JOSHUA RODRIGUEZ 72
14 KEVIN KOWALSKI 70
15 ALEX HALLFORD 70
16 FERNANDO BRAMSMARK 69
17 GUILLAME MOCQUAIN 68
18 WILLIS KIMBEL 66
19 MATTIAS INGERSTEDT 64
20 JULIEN BENOLIEL 63
21 HUNTER OKANO 64
22 DAVID STENSTRÖM 64
23 STEFAN BOUSSAC 62
24 DRAKE MOHR 62
25 SKY SILJEG 61
26 MARTINO CATTANEO 61
27 RILEY STEVENS 60
28 ROBBIE RUSSO 59
29 DANIEL VARGAS 58
30 DANNY TUMIA 58
31 ANDREAS LINDSTRÖM 56
32 VINCENT MATHERON 54
33 FRANK FARIA 53
34 ADAM HOPKINS 51
35 BALDER LEHMAN 50
36 DANIEL CUERVO 48
37 TREVOR MORGAN 42
38 JEREMY TUFFLI 41
39 CHRISTOPHER BAJO 39
40 STEVEN REEVES 0