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Marseille Boule Riders Cup Guest Reporter:Matt "Prawny" Naylor
A tale of many colorful characters including : Geordie, Salami Boy, The Sultan, UG, Manbeast, Saltbeast, Johnfromcalifornia, Bob, Homeslice, Sage, Red, Jethro and a handful of retards.
I guess this must be salami boy?
Which means this must be the Sultan I will try and keep this brief as my usual writing style includes every stupid detail. Left work early at 1 and went to Meanwhile to meet Fraser (Esssex painter and decorator) and relax a little with a few warm up beers, then a few more. Got to Waterloo for some extra surcharges on the tickets (£90). Met the Manimal who for once in life was early. Purchased a crate of Stella and boarded the Eurostar. This is where it starts to get interesting.
Train load of monkeys
About 6 to seven beers deep the mini stereo system is introduced to the carriage and ACDC fire up. Essex shouts does anyone ave a problem with this? Yes echoed back. So then an impromptu ACDC shrine was set up in the corridor.
Metal Weller and Geordie
Enter Geordie. Geordie is a man amongst men. On hearing the ACDC he was in. Bugs Bunny t shirt and loafers. It turns out he was on a stag do with a less enthusiastic crowd. He knew the words to every song and played a mean air guitar. People reaction to our corridor concert was varied, from scorn to laughter. From there onwards we changed trains for the sleeper train to Marsielle and stocked up on more booze. On entering our sleeper carriage it was just us so we set up a brief Who concert. Then we had guests, two froggies. So once again we had a corridor concert. By now we drunk off our arses and Essex proceeded to spray the place with beer. At this point Salami boy was born. Then we hit the chronic and proceeded to wack 1/2 of the Manimals weed supply for the weekend, around this point details were very hazy I remember the numbers 3 and the letters AM. Then waking up on the top bunk of the sleeper at about 5.30AM feeling rough and drenched in sweat.
Concentration camp
The sleeper cabins are tiny, my face was about a foot from the ceiling. It was red hot in there and no windows open there is no air conditioning and 6 people reusing the same air. It was hell, but also throw in Manimal snoring and a plastic mattress to boot and throw in the noise of a high speed train and a continual rocking, plus the need for a piss. I was near death. But we made it to Marseille around 8Am in the morning. By now mr hangover had me. I survived a subway ride and made it to the skatepark thinking only of a greasy Quick burger to settle me. But it was shut so we went to this big cafeteria with bright lights etc... where things spiraled for me. The world was spinning and liquid like. My arms had pins and needles, I laid on the floor to try to reconnect with earth. Weller and Manimal left me in that position. Then the stomach spasmed and I grabbed a see through plastic bag and proceeded to loudly put everyone off their food. Once I had filled the bag I left. From then on my day improved with Quick burgers and beer and weed. It was me and Essex who kept up a constant of all 3. We sat under a tree in the shade and got wasted, to the point where Essex became UG and the Sultan. Ug was a primitive character who simply drunk/smoked and grunted. The Sultan was more of a swanky fellow who sported a wet towel wrapped around his head as a sun protection device. It was dam hot. We watched the skating and swam in the sea and kept it primitive. Around this point Saltbeast was created. Manimal returned from the sea and dried out leaving huge rings of salt on his face. Then the theory goes that the Saltbeast gains power from the sea and needs to recharge every now and then...you have to know Manimal to know how much fun a new name for him is. I remember trying to skate a one point with the ability of my mum.
Emilio killing it Any way Manimal and Emillio the Spaniard made the cut and to there credit skated amazing. It was so hot that manimal half way thru a run threw up...nice. Johnfromcalifornia was quite literally John from California. On meeting him he introduced himself as Johnfromcalifornia. Making us 'Naylorfromkent', 'Fraserfromessex', 'Johnfromsouthwoodford' and 'Alexfromsouthwoodford'. Which became a fun game and still is. Although 'Nicfromsidcup' was kinda there first. (of course i was I've been saying that shit for about 15 years!)
jonfromcaliforniafrontsidekickflipindyoverthehip
Sage, Red and Jethro for those who don't know are the builders of the legendary burnside skatepark in USA. They basically made their own skatepark under a motorway and its super gnarly. They happened to be building a park in Switzerland and took time out to ride Marseille. There was a big crew which included women and children. They looked pretty hill Billy / hickish, but they rode the park in that style. Carefree gnarl with lazy ol transfers. Jethro by the way bares an uncanny resemblance to Jetro Tull, full beard, hair combo. Red was fun as he had huge sunglasses and a flat peaked cap (see pic below).
The evening wasn't that eventful, we had a good feed courtesy of Homeslice/vans which was nice and then went to the beach to smoke and throw rocks at Bob (a buoy) floating about 20 foot out. This is where I pulled my trick of the weekend. After a long period of monging my hand found a large round rock which said throw me. So I took a run up gave a battle cry and launched my rock, it hit Bob dead centre and bounced all the way back to beach. It was my time... The next day consisted of much the same. But the skating was amazing. The finals sported some of the best skating I'd ever seen.
I'm informed this is an alley-oop lien Alex Girraud was incredible making every trick look too easy. He rocked backside flip indys over the hip nollie to switch 5'0 over the hip and did every transfer possible.
Emilio again
TV's Mark Churchill, fs indy
Olly Todd, Hip Lien
Manimal put down some good runs making the park look small and his head look big. emillio did I think some of the best runs of the contest : Carve line, frontside slob over the hip, carve, backside air the hip (4/5 foot) transfer to 50/50 over the big hip mute the spine, then bam 360 indy over the spine. Or come out of b/s tailslide revert to half cab mute the spine.....also he threw down 360 over the hip and nearly landed a 540 over the hip. Eventually the comp ended and Manimal came 5th, Emillio 3rd. Alex Giraud 1st of course.
It's not unusual to see Emilio smiling, but he's got good reason this time! Then we finally got to skate for a bit, Wellerman was on fire with backside and frontside grabs over the hip. I managed a hazy melon fakie over the hip. We had a few last carves and made the miserable journey back to the station. The journey back was much like the journey there except we ran out of beer after about an hour, so we just smoked ourselves silly. There ends a memorable (barely) Boule Riders Cup. Thankyou, I'm your host Matt Naylor, GOODNIGHT |
