Logan Clark. True mizou. The Flow. Columbus, Ohio.

Words by Brian Krans
Photos by B.J. Bales

Starring:
Justin “Jefferson” Augustus
Logan “Wolverine” Clark
Kenton “Gangsta” Angerman
“Daddy” Dante Muse
Shawn “Damn Right” Malloy
Shawn “Pearl Cap” Warndorf
Nick “Brian Doesn’t Know My Last Name”
Josh “Grillz” Michaelc
Brian “Mom” Krans
Bruce “Juice” Bales
Jan-Michael “Yahn” Andresen
Dustin “Pretty” Dieter
and “Little” Ben Forsythe, Brian “Quiet” Simonsmeier and Aaron “Hulk” Schultz as “The Galena Three”

Friday
Somewhere along Interstate 74, breaking into Indiana, everything became clear.

Jefferson was hallucinating and 13-year-old Ben Forsythe finally came down from the Mountain Dew and Nos high that kept him up all night. Everyone else was asleep.

This was the way to the Bitter Cold Showdown. The 15-passenger van carrying 14 skaters from Iowa, Illinois and Nebraska already smelled like a bag of garbage left at the curb in July. It matched the smell of my apartment, where nearly everyone slept the night before, after sessioning SkateChurch until 11 p.m.

The weather, however, was anything but July.

The sky crapped hail, freezing rain and snow. Our eight-hour drive turned to nearly 10 as the wheels spun at 95 mph and then later crept to 30 as the weather worsened.

We pulled into the Flow’s parking lot about an hour and a half before qualifiers began. B.J. Bales was waiting for us in the parking lot. His drive from Pittsburgh was a little quicker than ours.

I’d like to say everyone got in and started skating immediately, but that’d be a lie. Everyone needed a helmet for the open session, but not everyone had one.

At a Toys ‘R’ Us just down the road, Logan, Shawn Warndorf and I scoured through little kids helmets to find something that would fit. “I’m not wearing a pink helmet,” Logan said as I held up a High School Musical one.

Instead, he found a black one and Shawn grabbed a lovely pearl one, complete with erasable pastel markers.

The Flow is big like the way you think of outer space as big.

It’s an enormous warehouse complete with something I had never seen. Hundreds of rollerbladers. Hundreds. All were hitting the ramps in the warm-up session, but there was plenty of room to get in a trick.

Iowa started hitting the ramps while picking out pros as we came in. Bailey, the Kelsos, Morales, Haffey. The people whose names were on the skates everyone was wearing were right beside them.

Outside, I started talking to Alex Broskow. We talked about his upcoming pro skates from Valo, the tradeshow, how well an unknown can do at the comp and what he expected of the next day.

“I’m just going to look to be having fun,” he said. “That’s when the best stuff happens.”

He must have had a ton of fun because 24 hours later, he walked away with the Bitter Cold mallet.

Just as they were clearing the park to end the session and get everyone registered for qualifiers, I started talking with Erik Bailey, who is someone we talked about in the van — especially about his magical mustache. He wouldn’t be competing because he hurt his tailbone a few days earlier at a different park.

When he asked about the Iowa scene, I told him about all the guys we had with us, the Iowa Connection and as much else as I could. His eyebrows went up when I told him about Davenport’s new park. He said he wanted to skate it.

Clearing the park meant everyone was forced outside. That was just a bad idea.

Our van, our big stinky van, came under siege. Damien Wilson, Nick Wood and the rest of the Santee Crew took on Iowa in an ice ball fight. Outnumbered, we held our ground as the van took a beating. Brian Simonsmeier landed some of the best counterattacks.

With one loud shout, our crews formed as one and launched snow and ice into the unarmed crowd waiting to get back into the park. The police response was quick.

Iowa competes
Standing atop a roll-in before his qualifier, Kenton Angerman’s trademark yellow Iowa basketball jersey was iconic, making him stand out from the dozen other skaters in his heat.

He began his run with two attempts at an alleyoop makio on the new bauer box, but fell into the volcano both times. His 270 backside backslide to fakie across the same box and bio 540 over the hip kept the Iowans screaming.

Josh Michaelc’s run was cut short when he fell and hit his face on the concrete floor on his third attempt at a true mizou on the down ledge. Dustin Dieter picked up the other half of his front tooth off the course.

Dustin was the next from our crew to go. He got the announcer’s attention with a disaster double shifty back royale to fakie on the down ledge. He was the first skater of the comp to touch the quarter transfer to wallride back down into the roll in.

With those three skaters, Iowa was done competing for the night. No one made the cut.

From left: Dustin Dieter of Omaha, Justin “Jefferson” Augustus of Des Moines, Jan Andresen of Des Moines, Logan Clark of Newton and Shawn Warndorf of Newton.

After checking into our motel rooms — or should I say “room,” because only keys to one room worked — we were off to search for food at midnight. Driving around the east side of Columbus, I was tired and hungry, so I ended our search in a completely ill-advised stop I still can’t apologize for enough.

The Iowa rollerbladers went to White Castle.

Logan and I had plenty of our 30-burger crave case left over to feed to Chicago’s Colin Martin and his friends later at the hotel room. We managed to clog both toilets the first night.

Saturday
We all headed out to the tradeshow, or what Bailey called “a way for everyone to get together and share thoughts.” With every major company represented, the Iowa skaters went shopping. Little Ben cleaned house with a free set of wheels and the usual posters, stickers and magazines. Brian Shima tossed him a free T-shirt when he yelled out, “Nimh rules.”

Dante yacked it up with old friends while the rest of us said our hellos to skaters and owners of companies from all over the country. We stocked up to make the van feel even smaller.

Around then, Nick decided he needed to fly back to Cedar Rapids. He spent the majority of the trip feeling sick or sleeping, and he couldn’t miss work Monday morning. So off he went.

Later in the afternoon, the comp began. Dustin and I found some of the best seats in the house by standing up on the orange section of the course in the midst of Haffey, Bailey, Julian Bah and Jeff Stockwell. Never mind, Crazy Tom had the best seat — in the middle shooting photos.

Crazy Tom of St. Louis.

While the pros were throwing hammers all over the park like an exploding hardware store, the rest of us took to the smaller side of the course in a massive snake session with dozens of other skaters. There was some awesome talent, even before the pros started mixing in.

Then it was Logan’s turn on the course. He laced a clean torque across the bauer box. He alleyooped a wallride across a quarter in the middle of a pyramid, ending it with a fakie 720 to a 6-foot drop. (This would later be copied, but never duplicated, by someone else in the semifinals).

Other tricks of his included a 270 backside torque to soul down the bauer box and a roll up a ledge clearing the grind box to land in a skinny steep quarter. The announcer noticed it.

“Number 133 getting creative. Logan Clark of Iowa,” he said, which was followed by a loud, “Iowhat!” from the rest of us. Sadly, it’d be the only run he’d have.

Ben Forsythe and Brian Simonsmeier, both of Galena, Ill.

Finals
The finals were intense. I can’t think of any other way to say it.

Stockwell skated the entire park, sometimes linking five-trick lines. Haffey went huge with a 360 soul from a quarter to an eight-foot sub box. Shima upped it with a soul to true soul on the same spot. Broskow was all over, with a huge 14-foot 540 transfer from quarter to wall, 360 disaster top soul and a lot more.

Hit after hit, voices hoarse from screaming, the crowd continued to yell its acceptance. The crowd couldn’t be unimpressed with this level of skating. Going big married with technical.

Afterwards, Stockwell talked with me for a bit about his run before he found out it was good enough to earn him second place.

“I thought it was a really good comp. Everyone skated really, really well. I just had a good time,” he said. “The park is amazing. I hope they have it here next year.”

Waiting to hear the winners, I asked Jon Julio about creating a solid scene since Logan’s interview from the Connection was fresh in my brain. He said weekly sessions, a Web site and road trips to hook up with other scenes were things that make skating scenes strong.

“It’s all about getting people together,” he said.

Judging by that, Iowa’s already there.

As Broskow was announced the winner, Julio smiled wide.

“I didn’t think he was going to win. Maybe Haffey or Stockwell, but not Alex,” he said. “I can’t complain, but I can’t believe it.”

After the comp, we all headed to downtown to the premiere of the Six Won Six video. As soon as we squeezed our fat van into a parking garage, we heard the leaking tire. We got the spare off and realized the steel belt in the spare was not only showing but also rusted to shit. Dante, Shawn Malloy and I took forever to fix it, knowing we’d have to buy a new one in the morning.

That night we chilled in the hotel rooms with some skaters from New York and other skaters, including Jaren Grob and some Chicago people. Colin stopped by again. Beers were drank. Fun was had. Ass was dropped.

Mystery man.

Sunday
We got our new tire and checked out after some hotel employee told us it was about time.

Although the weather on the way back was better, the climate in the van wasn’t. With White Castle and Buffalo Wild Wings comprising our major meals over the weekend, let’s just say the van was ripe.

No one hesitated to get out at any stop.

Once we hit Davenport, everyone got the hell out of the van and the hell out of Dodge.

It was one helluva fun trip, but a long one.

I couldn’t turn the van — that big smelly beast of a vehicle — back over to the rental company quick enough.