The stops have been announced for the 2009 es game of Skate. All the stops from California to Florida are posted up on the site. Even the European stops are up and there are still more stops in the United States to be added through time.

When it comes to games of skate, none are more official than the es game of Skate. It’s the proving ground when it comes to the famous flat ground trick battle. The current world AM champion is Carlos Lastra who threw it down last year at the Maloof Money Cup.

There are tons of entrants that get in on this contest every year so be sure to bring your “A” game to the stop you compete at. Last year I entered the competition in Phoenix, Arizona. There were 274 contestants signed up all together, it was ridiculous. Just entering the contest was intimidating knowing there were that many competitors. Overall it was super fun to do and after each person that got through their first round received a sheet of free griptape and a t-shirt. Pretty awesome right? I had a blast last year and it helped that the competition was held at a pretty sweet skatepark to. I ended up getting 3rd place and left content and stoked at the many friends I had made that day and the overall experience I had competing.

It’s free to enter and only comes around once a year. See you there homies!

Twice a year the action sports industry comes together to showcase and display what they have in store for the upcoming year. ASR, the Action Sports Retailers tradeshow, brings together not only the big players of the action sports industry, but gives up and coming brands the opportunity to launch their brands to the industries who’s who. One major difference that’s notable this year is the absence of the major footwear companies. Brands such as Sole Technology (Etnies, ES, Emerica), and Globe have opted out of attending the show. Being that ASR is heavily influenced by skate and surf brands, the absence of these brands is quite apparent. But this may be a grand opportunity for other brands to step up and shine in their place. With such a void of the presence, other themes and brands are catching people’s attention.

Noticeable surf brands that were showing what they could bring to the table were your obvious contenders, Quik, Bong, Hurley, Volcom, and Lost. There were a lot of other notable brands that also were making an unexpected presence at the show as well. Smaller brands that focus on surf like Ezekiel, Lost, and Fox all made the push to showcase their spring lines.

Since the main focus of the show is to highlight the spring lines, there was no shortage boardshorts, swimwear, walkshorts, tanks and tees. Bright colors and geometric graphics still prove to hold strong and look to continue through until next year. Neons and fluorescent colors seem to still highlight the slimmer shorter silhouettes of boardies and shorts. Always leading the pack and pushing the envelope with the boardshorts is Billabong. All the boardshorts on display looked to be leaning toward the shorter length, veering away from the standard over the knee boardies that have been the standard in the industry for many years. Jumbo all over graphics, mixing geometrics with animal prints, the Billabong assortment proved to be new and exciting while stilling to their roots as clean and wearable boardshorts.

One notably cool disply on the ASR floor was the Quiksilver compound. They had a total of 4 booths at the show to exhibit their range of men’s, core, and woman’s divisions as well as a full set up for Roxy. Between this massive layout they displayed their timeline in boardshort history. The lounge exhibit held cases of boardshorts from the 70’s, 80’s, 90’s and today to give buyers and visitors a like a brief history not only of what Quiksilver has brought to the surfing community, but how it shaped and set the standard for the industry throughout time. Most interesting of all was to see how the styles of today can truly be accredited to how things use to be as fashion has seem to come full circle within action sports.

Though the show was much calmer this year, there was nothing subdued about the brands and activity that was still in attendance. It will be interesting to see how the industry moves into the Fall 2009 season. This week the east coast gets a taste of what is to come for the Spring 2009 season as we move to Orlando, Florida for Surf Expo.

The new scheduled stops for the éS Game of S.K.A.T.E. have recently been announced. Contests like these are great because everyone can get involved as the éS game of skate is and always has been free to play. This means you can basically enter and have fun because you’re playing with nothing to lose. Don’t you just love that? Plus, it gives you a shot to try out all the tricks you have been practicing all year long when going up against fellow skateboarders.

Last years championship finals were intense. It was a show worthy of the wait and it’s always awesome to see two perfect match-ups going head to head. Landing tricks back to back, hearing the crowd get into it… It truly is amazing.

I really wish they would do more stops on the tour though and hopefully that’s the direction they’re moving. I strongly encourage local shops that want to get more involved with local riders to throw these kinds of events as well. They work wonders for bringing the skate community together and because they’re so inexpensive to put on, they don’t have to be hosted by some major skate brand. Anything that gives all skateboarders a chance to participate is rad in my book.

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