This year marks 2hip’s 25th anniversary and to help celebrate they brought back the infamous Meet The Street contest. The last MTS was back in 2003 in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park. Five years have passed and the location has changed, but the laid back, local vibe and the crazy course setup remained the same. And as it turns out, the winner of the contest remained the same as well.
Ron Wilkerson, the man behind 2hip and Meet The Street.
Ron W. and the 2hip crew had tons of sketchy and unique ramps set up on San Francisco’s Treasure Island on Saturday when a ton of riders showed up. The day went on with everyone riding and enjoying the weather and BBQ along with the nearby ditch spot (see photos slideshow from the other day). In true MTS fashion, there wasn’t much of a solid game plan, so Saturday was dubbed a “practice” day.
By the end of the contest the van setup was wrecked. Minutes after I shot this photo it was wrecked some more, then flipped over
When Sunday rolled around it seemed like a few less people showed up for the actual contest than the day before. There were 8 riders in the “great” (or am) class that all threw down their best moves before the “really great” (or pro) riders hit the course. We will have a video with all the best riding posted real soon so I’ll call out a few of the highlights from the event that you may not get from any video on the Web.
The van had seen better days… People were not nice to the van.
- At the end of the contest a dude with a bloody/mangled face (smashed while riding—wait for that clip in the video) did donuts in a Corvette in the parking lot.
- The ramps seemed to get sketchier and less safe as the days went on. By the end of the contest it looked like the ramps were literally about to fall over.
- A handful of riders that I have never heard of or seen before went full speed at the quarter to wallride and it was awesome.
- As the 2hip crew started to disassemble the ramps at the end of the day people were still trying to ride them. Eddie Cleveland, who hadn’t ridden the setup all weekend did a footjam on the setup as if it was a sub box and people went nuts as if it was one of the best tricks of the contest.
- Shea Nyquist did a backflip off a small kicker to flat and ate shit. Nearly all of his titanium spokes broke and his wheel was done.
- The BBQ that I had a picture of the other day was in fact as good as it looked. I got to try it after they cut the price in half at the end of the day. The BBQ people were out there making money for some kind of prom.
- The Island the contest was held on was wild… For the most part it looked like a vacant/abandoned industrial area. However, there were a few low-income housing buildings on the island and a naval station of some kind. There were Blue Angel and other fighter planes flying over head doing aerial stunts throughout the weekend which made for a cool spectacle but were loud as shit.
- There was a Steven Hamilton sighting on Sunday. He rode a few people’s bikes, did some one-footed x-ups, and skated around while wearing a crazy hat.
- While Ron W. was trying to announce the winners a handful of rowdy dudes (and dudets) rocked over the van. Ron W. ran over there and tried to single-handily stop them, but he was out numbered and the van ended up on its side. Then they flipped it right back over.
The contest winding down in beautiful San Francisco.
Big thanks to Ron W. and the 2hip crew for the good times. Hopefully they got the parking lot cleaned up and the wall re-painted last night… They had a lot of work left to do when we dipped out at 7pm to drive back down to L.A.
Hope to see you out at the next Meet The Street!
2008 2hip Meet The Street Results – Great Class (Am)
1. Brandon Eckles
2. Anthony Renda
3. Austin McNaughton
4. Elliot Negron
5. Collin Moier
6. Eric Mergon
7. Cam
Amateur winners: Anthony, Brandon, & Austin
2008 2hip Meet The Street Results – Really Great Class (Pro)
1. Kurtis Elwell
2. Tony Campos
3. Chad Batista
4. Chris Savoy
5. Ronny Michelini
6. Wes Rhoe
7. Ari Petit
8. Colby Kanawah
Pro winners: Chad, Kurtis, & Tony
(*Note: I wouldn’t doubt it every one of these names are spelled wrong. All we had to go off was the judges sheets that looked like chicken scratch. Sorry about any misspellings. Send emails to fattony@transworld.net for corrections.)
In case you missed it, here is the photo gallery from Saturday. We didn’t shoot many photos on Sunday because we were filming all day. Look for the video by tomorrow morning.
But until then, here’s a quick rough edit of the event that Chris San Agustin was able to put together while we were stuck driving through the night back to L.A.
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