Now then, now then, now then…

Ten minutes later and the group of rowdy females hit the Parisien pavements, accompanied by markers porting speaker equipped rucksacks, for 3,5 km of running. Amidst laughter and cheers, we wound our way around the Canal St. Martin and back via République. I smuggly ran the course, boasting about how ‘easy’ it was for me, but was surprised to be subjected to such a hard ‘warm-down’. By harsh, I mean 20 minutes of various stretches and exercises that obviously a winter of abstinence from anything but snowboarding / skating didn’t help deal with.

This week-end Nike organise We Run Paris, a 10 km run exclusively for women. A great initiative from Nike’s part because even if my thighs / cellulite won’t be up for it, a run that ressembles more of a Friday night Pub Crawl, (minus the pints of Magners and pork scratchings ) is definitely worth considering giving a go.

I arrived without a Yoga mat, which wasn’t practical, as I spotted various DJ cables aligning the wooden decking. Luckily, Chloé hooked me up with her gym towel, which kept blowing away as soon as I lifted a limb.

For a Sunday morning in blustery conditions, I was surprised at the turn out, but the hour long lesson was a just long enough to feel ‘healthy’ or whatever, for the rest of the day. For those who are really motivated (we weren’t) there’s even a pilates lesson half an hour after. Free yoga on a Sunday morning, is basically the hangover cure that will compliment your Bloody Mary.

Soirée FAT GYPSY PARTY jeudi soir au Wanderlust Paris !
-FAT line-up avec : Irfane des Outlines, Lil’ Mike du crew BIRDY NAM NAM, les DJ R-ASH et Manaré
-Diffusion du docu sur les légendes du Skate 80′s “Bones Brigade : An autobiography”
-Défi de bras de fer Sailor Jerry
-Entrée gratuite !

We are hosting a big FAT GYPSY PARTY at the Wanderlust this Thursday !              The line up for the evening :  Irfane des Outlines, Lil’ Mike from BIRDY NAM NAM, DJ R-ASH and Manaré                                                                                                   - First screening of the skate documentary Bones Brigade in France                          - An arm wrestle organized by Sailor Jerry (win a wrestle, win a shot !)                           – Free Entry !!

Récemment, une jeune boîte de production, WRFilmed m’a demandé une interview, voici le clip-web :

Views on Skateboarding, associated a photographic exhibition, projections of skate films and an amateur skate contest over the course of the week-end.

The organisers, who go under the collective name of Nollie exhibited paintings and photography from professional skate photographers, such as Cedric Viollet to those of the pro- skater, Samuel Partaix who displayed a personal collection of shots, documenting several skate trips with his friends.

My personal coup de coeur was came in the form of a tomb shaped skate board courtest of the collective WoodiArt.

The court-métrage Qui Sera le Maitre produced by by the French skater, Sylvain Robineau, was shown in a small downstairs cinema, alongside a series of short films by the skate brand Oxelo, shot in India, Miami, Berlin and Morocco, courtesy of by Capsus Films. 

Views on Skateboarding was a super initiative from Nollie, who successfully brought the art of skating without any pretense, to the public for a week-end.

If you’re as passionate about skating, surfing, music and art as I am, then get down to the European Cultural Capital 2013  (that’s Marseille to you and me) for the THIS IS (NOT) MUSIC festival.

From the 25th of April until the 9th of June, THIS IS (NOT) MUSIC festival will dedicate a huge open space to celebrating board and street culture, through contemporary art, music, action sports, street art, customization, graphic art and film projections.

Organized around a large exhibition, this manifestation initiated by the Cabaret Aléatoire, will hold concerts and soirées, installations and street art performances, sports demo’s and competitions, film and documentary projections, conferences, meetings and radio presentations that will be spread right out over the Friche and on into some more unique surrounding areas !

This is a list of just some of what will be going down over the course of the event :

Eric Koston 2 CHOMP OLLIE TOUR supported by Nike

Sausage Fest skate demonstration sponsored by VOLCOM

Tommy Guerrero and his band

Sound Pellegrino Thermal Team

Major Lazer

Woodkid

Wu-Tang Clan

Pro Team RVCA skate

Skate in 1960′s France Conference

The wood derives from the Gascogne forests in the south-west of France and every board is hand-crafted individually by one of their ‘shapers’ and to correspond with the demands of the individual. With a team of collaborating artists and surfers that counts Robin Falxa, Margaux Arramon Tucoo, Jerome Junqua and Kim Francis, and based in Biarritz and Anglet, Footloose brings skating right back to its surfing roots.

In Paris, the food puritans put a hex on American fast-foods, or just Americans years ago. It’s only recently that they’re opening up to the idea of welcoming Uncle Sam’s rapid restauration. And that was in no means easy feat for Ronald and co. José Bové made sure there was no inauguration party held. A fews years later and the food truck phenomenen drove over here and in the space of 12 months, trucks have opened up from Paris, from St Honoré, Montreuil to Menilomontant.

@Lia_S_P

My friend Valentine runs Le Réféctoire, (mentionned in a previous post)  a food truck that she created selling ‘gourmet burgers, made with 100 % local produce, which got an approving nod  from the rigorous Parisian food mafiosa. In order to drum up a little more excitement over the sub-zero winters, Valentine had the great idea, like Blair River, to propose a variation of the the standard burger size- and triple it. Three huge steaks, 3 slices of Compté cheese, 6 slices of bacon, mayonnaise, tomatoes and lettuce. My habitual Sunday hangover could be cured, I cunningly thought as I got ready this morning.

Direction 305 rue des Pyrenées for a date with Mr Big. Burger.

An hour later and sitting in front of me would feed a catwalk model for a year, all 3,000 calories of it. I wasted no time in hooking in, although, and despite my best efforts I couldn’t actually get it all in my mouth for a bite. The bacon was sweet and crispy, the cheese not too over-powering and melted on each steak to perfection. None of the artificial orange rubbery shit you get at Mc Donalds. The bun was lightly toasted and slightly sweet.

For a whole 10 minutes, I forgot about the 3 degree chill and indulged in a Big.

The X Games to the purist snowboarders are what the H.O.G group is to the Hells Angels, mainstream, pro-establishment and commercial. For the others, i.e. me, it’s the one of the rare occasions I watch American commentated sports, and bloody enjoy it.  I followed all the disciplines (except the snowmobile ) at Aspen and to be honest, I’m impressed / jealous of the way riders are going bigger, more technical and integrating yet another cork into their tricks for victory, but is it really the direction we want our sport to go in? The answer is a big fat NO. But then, if you want to see steezy style and boards grabbed so hard that you actually start counting their ‘hang-time’ don’t watch the X-Games. There are videos for that, filmed in Mini DV, circa 1995.

I’ve been following the X-Games, faithfully tuning in at ridiculous hour to watch along with millions of others to see if Shaun White will do something entertaining other than piss everyone off and sit by himself in the riders area, so for those who have had a social life this week-end, or were reluctant to pay the 4,99 € (yep, you’ve got to pay now) I can conclude the best bits in one article.

Jealous ?

So, here goes, the snowboard big air was a battle of the corks. Torstein Horgmo triple corktaking back the gold medal from 2012′s winner, Mark McMorris.

Someone call Ryan Lochte and tell him to give me my grills back

Henrik Harlaut took Tanner Hall’s advice into account seconds and made his last jump an ‘historical one’ landing a triple cork 1620. I lost count. The judges gave him 50 points out of 50. His peers named him ‘The King of Big Air‘ I named him ‘The King of Maths‘.

A few days before the event, Mark Mc Morris criticized Shaun White and his nonchalant attitude to snowboarding, much to the American TV network’s delight. The Canadian insinuated that the Flying Tomato “didn’t know how to ride rails, rarely grabs his board” and WTF  “doesn’t even watch snowboarding” Oh Lord, shit’s going to go off I enthusiastically mused

It didn’t. Shaun fell, Mark won.

Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Shaun

Not even an angry word was uttered when he was asked if he’d started thinking about the Superpipe final after his slopestyle fail. “I won’t think about that until I’m in the car on the way to the competition,” Shaun, you may be too cool for school, but thanks for bringing Hollywood to snowboarding.

In the women’s snowboard slope-style, the Brit Aimee Fuller attempted a double backflip. I  personally thanked her on Twitter because it was late and I respect girls going all out at major competitions, alright? Jaime Anderson won. Again.

A pair of breasts. Funny one, guys

Talking about girls shredding, Elena Hight landed a double backside rodeo in the Superpipe becoming the first female to do so in a competition. She earned herself a hefty silver medal and a message from Travis Pastrana on twitter in the process : “Watching @XGames with @lynzskate and fell out of my chair when@elenahight landed that double cork 1080. Girls are going big!. “Jealous.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SoLpPZVTIr8

Travis’s love wasn’t enough to get the top spot and narrowly missed out to Kelly Clark who threw put a smooth 1080 out there, straight off the bat.

Once again, the Superpipe ski event was missing one person, the late Sarah Burke. The half-pipe steeze- queen, who passed away last year. It was Maddie Bowman that dominated the final with her first run. and subsequently took the gold.

David Wise threw down in skiing, notably with back to back double cork 1260′s and made the podium one that Barack Obama would be proud of- all American. Although, personally, my favorite ‘trick’ was pulled by none other than Tanner ‘Marley‘ Hall, during practices who lazily ended his run with a 360, busting out the last 180 so fucking late you’d think he was hanging around for the finals to start.

Tanner Hall warming up

It was his pipe frenemy Simon Dumont that finished third, taking that age old snowboarders ‘poles are for dancers’ jibe to heart and skied sans batons, but then he had apparently broken both his wrists.

The final day saw Kaya Turski’s reign in women’s ski slopestyle come to an abrupt end, as the younger and extremely talented Norweigan, Tiril Sjastad Christiansen who claimed her first X-Games medal, and a gold one at that. The American Nick Goepper jumped onto the top of the podium in the mens division.

Shaun White proved cutting shedding his copper locks (for charidee)  didn’t have the initial Samson effect some had suspected after his slopestyle fail, and took home his 6th consecutive Superpipe gold medal.

Hey Ginger Spice, need any extensions ?

 IN FRENCH

Cette semaine, je suivais les X-Games, toutes les disciplines, qui se déroulent à Aspen et si je suis honnête, je suis jalouse/ impressionnée par le niveau des rideurs, encore plus gros, encore plus technique et aérien, ajoutant encore un cork aux figures, pour remporter les prestigieuses médailles en or. Les gens gueulent sur les réseaux sociaux et les forums, “ce n’est pas le vrai esprit du snowboard” et ils ont raison. Mais en même temps, si t’as envie de regarder du vrai style, des tricks tellement grabbés avec plus de hang time que Michael Jordan, il suffit de regarder un bon film de snow des années 90, tournés en Mini DV.

J’ai été une spectateur très fidèle à la programmation, je regarde tous les jours a l’heure prévu avec des millions d’autres fans, pour suivre les événements et surtout voir si Shaun White va faire quelque chose de plus amusant que d’énerver tout le monde et de rester dans son coin dans le riders area. Alors pour ceux qui ont une vie sociale ou qui ne voulaient pas se servir de leur CB (oui, ça coute 4,99€ de regarder en ligne !) je vous ai fait une sommaire de l’événement dans une article.

Le big-air snowboard était une véritable bataille de ‘corks’ (les figures vrillés). Torstein Horgmo rentre un switch triple cork pour la première place devant Mark Mc Morris et en ski, Henrik Harlaut score un incroyable 50 sur 50 pour un triple cork 1620. Ses pairs l’ont couronné ‘le roi du Big Air‘. Je l’ai nommé le ‘Roi des mathématiques.’

La discipline la plus attendu depuis Tanner Hall VS Simon Dumont en 1997, le snowboard slopestyle entre Shaun White et Mark Mc Morris. Mark a osé ouvrir sa bouche dans une interview quelques jours plus tôt et a constaté que la Tomate Volante “ne maitrise pas des rails, il grabbe rarement sa planche” et- ohlala – “qu’il ne regarde pas le snowboard.” Doux jésus, le plus gros clash depuis Booba et La Fouine s’annonce !

Bref, ca n’a pas duré longtemps, Shaun est tombé, Mark a gagné.

Tout en gardant le bon esprit de la discipline, Shaun n’a pas dit de mal sur son adversaire et a confié à la présentatrice qu’il ne penserait pas à la finale super-pipe jusqu’au trajet dans sa voiture vers la compétition. Shaun, t’es trop classe. Merci d’amener le cinéma Hollywoodien au snowboard.

Chez les femmes, Aimee Fuller tente un double backflip, je l’en ai remercié sur Twitter. Je suis quand-même sympa comme fille. Le résultat était prévisible, Jamie Anderson replaque un run tellement solide et technique (des rotations en front, back, cab et switch back).

Elena Hight a failli volé le titre de la grande dame Kelly Clarke, quand elle devient la première femme à rentrer un double backside rodéo et a payé son message perso de Travis Pastrama: ‘tombé de ma chaise quand elle l’a replaqué, Les filles envoient du lourd’. Jalousie

Mais à sa grand déception et beaucoup d’autre fans sur twitter qui se sont misent au réseau social pour exprimer leur mécontentement contre le score trop bas de Hight, Le respect pour Travis n’est malheureusement pas suffisant et Kelly Clark s’impose, rentrant un 1080 premier tricks.

Encore une fois, le Superpipe ski femmes a souffert du manque de la star de la discipline, Sarah Burke, la reine du style qui est décédé l’année dernière. C’était donc la jeune Maddie Bowman qui s’impose avec son premier run et remporte la médaille d’or.

David Wise propose un run de rêves, avec notamment deux doubles corks 1260 sur les deux murs, pour un podium qui ferait plaisir à Barack Obama – 100% américain. Mon tricks préféré de la journée est un 360 effectué par Tanner ‘Marley’ Hall qui rentre le dernier 180 tellement ‘late’ qu’on se demandait s’il attendait les finales en bas du pipe.

C’était son ‘fr-enemy’ Simon Dumont qui a pris la blague des snowboarders à coeur ‘les pôles sont pour les danseuses’ et a skiait sans bâtons – il s”étais cassé ses deux poignées apparemment.