Seaside Sessions in Blackpool was the second stop of the 2023 UK Vert series which we covered in Issue 3. You can check out a simpler version of the article below. If you want to catch the full article, please buy Issue 3 here...
Cover Photo: Stu Bennett. Lorenzo Ferrari: Bs Boneless
Photo: Stu Bennett. Molly Seed: Fs Air
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On Saturday the third of June over 20 skaters competed at this year’s edition of Seaside Sessions, the second event of the UK Vert Series, which was held on the 12’ 9” vert at the 29000 square foot indoor skatepark at Ramp City in the large seaside resort of Blackpool on the North West coast of England. |
Besides the normal competition with it’s timed runs and 10-minute jam session, Jon Nixon, a Ramp City local, had also engineered an extension shaped like the iconic Blackpool tower which saw skaters navigating an extra two or so feet of vert to land their tricks and claim the glory of tricking the Blackpool tower. The Extension made an appearance twice over the course of the Friday night and Saturday sessions with numerous great tricks going down on each occasion. Some notable tricks included Annalise Lam’s Fs rock, Reiss Johnson’s transfer up to crail, Taylor Cunningham’s Fs Lipslide, Jack wallbridge’s Fs Fastplant, Kelly Turner’s transfer up to Bs
Boneless, Jim langran’s transfer up to Fs Nosegrind and Shuvit Nosegrind, and Jesse Thomas’ crail grab rewind grind and a Texas Plant grabbing lien instead of slob. A great addition to the normal ramp thanks to Jon Nixon!
Photo: Stu Bennett. Dave Allen: Fs Ollie
Both the Saturday extension session and the normal competition were subject to different commentators to the usual UK vert series competition with Greg Nowik taking the mic for Men’s open, Women’s open, Pro/am and the extension session, while Ted Cunningham provided his input on the master’s contest and prize giving. Both these first-time commentators provided excellent commentary all day long albeit a little less professional than what the Vert Series is used to.
Apart from the commentary some personal highlights for me included Reiss Johnson who spent the day blasting airs, stalling handplants and boosting his Fs bonelesses, Dave Allen who got inverted on an Alley-oop egg from the lower part of the ramp to the 6” higher extension at the end of the ramp and Tay Cunningham who made his first ever Stale 540 during the Pro/Am finals jam.
Photo: Stu Bennett. Reiss Johnson: Andrecht
Although it turned out to be a far quieter event than normal, I think it is safe to say that everyone involved had a good time nonetheless and that the event was a success thanks to the tireless efforts of Sean Kelly and the UK Vert Series team as well as Woody of Big Woody’s skate shop, which can be found at the park, and Jon Nixon who dedicated so much time prior to the event to ensuring that the roof was kept watertight and that the seaside theme was maintained on the decks through some fantastic decorations. Once again, a big thank you to the aforementioned for making Seaside Sessions a great event year on year.
Photo: Stu Bennett. Jon Nixon