Concrete Rodeo – Florence, Oregon Stop

Florence, the day after the loop challenge in Reedsport. Another day, another Airspeed skatepark, another Concrete Rodeo contest. The sun was beating down hard and the crowd was sparse and slow to arrive. Everyone was burned out from the day before, but a lot of people still had fun. Steven Reeves came in first in the joust again, followed by Lance Leisher, Matt Kline and Rion Linderman in 4th. Nothing out of the ordinary here except that Matt Kline is probably twice as old as the rest of the placers. Good skating. A&W Root Beer with a drive-through in walking distance… The city of Florence still hasn’t gotten around to planting grass over all the mounds of sand butting up against the concrete, which means that frequent broom breaks were needed to clean the park. [Insert sweeper joke here.] The photographer (me) wasn’t feeling it, so you get to look at a bunch of poorly exposed shots. A lot of these shots aren’t even from the contest. Kilwag photography… where we spell quality with a “K”. The locals and kids were coopoerative and friendly though, so here they are. Smile, you’re on the internet!

OK, these results are a little wacky. They had points to determine who met in the finals brackets with two skaters going head to head in a what they call a “Joust”. The jousts weren’t scored, so it was possible for a skater to advance farther in the joust than his point score would reflect, and they didn’t hold jousts to determine any place lower than 4th. Who are the real winners? If you say “All of us!” I’m going to have to smack you.