UNION-TRIBUNE

August 1, 2009

LOS ANGELES – Danny Way was limping.

Scratch that. Danny Way was hobbling.

Wanting to put on an impressive show at X Games 15 in a new skateboarding event he created, the Encinitas rider crashed Wednesday in practice and spent the next two days looking like a candidate for a knee replacement.

So what happened in last night’s Skateboard Big Air Rail Jam at Staples Center? The 35-year-old skater kept missing tricks, kept limping off the deck, kept trying, then collected the gold medal.

Way scored 92 points on the only ride he cleanly landed. Vista’s Bob Burnquist finished second (89) and Encinitas’ Rob Lorifice took third (87.33).

Walking into the press room on crutches, an ice bag wrapped around his right knee, Way said, “I don’t know why I always have to be the guy that has to get hurt and prove you can keep going. I don’t know if I like that title very much.”

At last year’s X Games, Way crashed so violently on the Big Air ramp that he was hospitalized, suffering torn ligaments and tendons in his right foot. He came back limping after that crash to win a silver medal.

“Everyone saw last year how much of a mad man he is,” Lorifice said. “He’s got a high pain tolerance.”

Way is a skateboarding icon. He introduced the huge, drop-in MegaRamp in a 2004 DC video that has become a fixture at the X Games. He jumped out of a helicopter. He cleared the Great Wall of China in 2005.

And he’s paid a price for his daredevil, push-the-limits style. His surgery count is up to 13, eight on his right knee, but no one doubted he’d compete yesterday.

Asked when he knew Way would skate, Burnquist said, “I knew before he got hurt. That’s the way Danny rides. Unless maybe his foot’s completely off. Even then you can kind of numb it and try to do something.”

Said Way, “I was very lucky to get out there today. I didn’t have too much expectation because I was hurt.”

The Big Air Rail Jam featured five skaters swooping down a 50-foot ramp, then trying to slide across a 28-foot rail and cleanly landing on another ramp. The riders had 30 minutes to land tricks.

Way crashed on his first attempt, awkwardly twisting his right ankle.

“He was barely able to stand up,” Lorifice said. “I don’t know how he does it. He’s amazing.”

Way kept skating, kept falling and kept riding back to the elevator that transported the riders to the rafters. With eight minutes remaining in the contest, Way finally landed a trick, called a Switch 50-50.

The Switch comes from Way leading with his right foot instead of his left. The 50-50 comes from grinding across the rail on his skateboard trucks.

Way was hoping to land a more difficult trick, but after hurting his ankle, he kept trying the Switch 50-50.

“Luckily, I made what I made,” he said.

Way now owns four X Games gold medals. He won Big Air the first three years it was held. He took the silver last year and thought he deserved the gold.

He passed on Big Air this time, wanting to expand his repertoire.

“It’s not like I set out to win gold medals,” Way said. “It’s nice to win gold medals, but it is not what my skateboarding’s about. It’s about trying to show people what’s impossible and what’s not. That’s what drives me.”

Meantime, he expects his right knee will require another surgery.

“I think it’s inevitable,” he said. “(But) I’m not done taking risks. I’m not done pushing the envelope.”

ASSOCIATED PRESS
By ANDREW DALTON
August 1, 2009

LOS ANGELES — Jake Brown finally has something else to talk about.

The skateboarder whose grisly, 40-foot fall to the floor of the X Games mega ramp two years ago drew gasps and became a viral video sensation, won gold Thursday night in the same Skateboard Big Air competition at Staples Center.

“Feels great I guess,” Brown said.

The 34-year-old Australian earned a 94 on the third of his five runs with a backside 360 over the mega ramp’s gap into a 20-foot-high McTwist over the half-pipe for his first X Games gold.

Brown’s 2007 spill knocked him unconscious and left him with a broken wrist, a cracked vertebra and a bruised lung.

It was six months before he got back on a skateboard, but when asked how long it took him to get his confidence back Brown said “probably about a day.”

Despite the near-death experience, he was the first to roll down the ramp last year.

Two-time defending champion Bob Burnquist of Rio de Janeiro, who made his winning run in 2007 just after watching Brown’s slam, managed to tie Brown’s winning score on Friday, but Brown had a better second run.

“I remember when he went down like that I could see him coming right back out,” said Burnquist, whose backyard mega ramp Brown used to get back in skating shape. “His type of skateboarding and his type of personality was just perfect to erase that and keep going. Now he’s sitting here with a gold medal. That’s insane.”

Rob Lorifice of Encinitas, Calif., won bronze.

The competition had its usual spills but nothing close to Brown’s fall or last year’s pair of crashes from mega ramp creator Danny Way that sent him to the hospital for several days.

“That was the best part of the whole contest,” Lorifice said, “that we’re all sitting here and talking and no one’s in the hospital.”

ESPN.com
By CHRIS NIERATKO
Published August 1, 2009

I imagine yesterday’s Big Air was a bit of a let down to many since no one got hurt. The past two years we’ve seen Jake Brown nearly die and Danny Way get severely injured in all too gruesome fashion. That footage was played and replayed on every sports channel across the globe for people’s “entertainment” much more than any of the makes. This year non-skater spectators were more than disappointed at Big Air with guys actually landing most of their tricks.

For many in the stands it seems it’s the slam that they look forward to, much like Nascar fans waiting for the crash. It’s really sad to think that a no-handed backside 360 across a huge cavern was looked at no differently than a fly ball hit to the outfield. I overheard one father in the stand point out to his on, “Oh, there he goes again.”

Meanwhile yesterday’s events had some serious drama. Two of our world’s top guys, Bob Burnquist and Jake Brown, were neck and neck, tied for first place going into the final round and yet people seemed disenfranchised. They were waiting for that big slam, that never came (thank God). It takes serious balls to go up there and do that stuff. One of skating’s legendary rippers, Chris Miller, said, “I’d have to skate vert every day for three months just to come even close to being able to do what these guys are trying.” That comes from a guy that still shreds on the regular.

I wish there was a way to convey to the viewing public how gnarly Rob Lorifice’s 540 rodeo is. Despite the fact THAT HE LANDED IT. But it’s impossible. I feel as if our skating elite must be sacrificed to the lions in order for the world to take note.

Today introduced a new discipline: the big rail jam. Now guys must risk being impaled midway through launching a mega gap onto a metal rail. It’s absurd. The only thing that could make it more intense is a ring of fire around the rail.

But the crowd at the Rail Jam today the got their money’s worth. The poor dudes trying to launch the gap to the rainbow rail got repeatedly pummeled. Slam after slam after slam for 30 minutes and each time the crowd ooh’d and ahh’d louder and louder. They were hungry for blood as if they hoped the next slam would be harder than the last. I saw Danny Way yesterday and he was hobbled, limping along.

Today he was dropping in with fury in his eyes attempting death-defying switch 50-50s on a massive Big Air rail. For a half hour he drilled himself trying it; each fall got the crowd more and more into it. He’d hop on one leg off the flat bottom. Occasionally he’d skate off, showing that the muscle memory in his legs knew how to stand on a board better than walk. I saw an unbridled emotion from the spectators that just wasn’t there yesterday for Big Air. With four minutes left in the jam Danny Way had zero points. He landed nothing. But he owned the crowd. He was Russell Crowe in the “Gladiator.” And when he finally stuck that switch 50-50, the place exploded.

I wonder if Danny had landed that switch 50-50 within the first few tries would the crowd have cared? Would they have cheered the way they did? Would they understand Danny was the only one dropping in switch for the majority of the contest?

Maybe we need to have guided tours of the Big Air Ramp for everyone in the stands, for everyone in America for that matter, to stand at the top of the ramp and stare down the barrel of that gun and see what it is these skaters are looking at before each run. Maybe then they’ll get a better understanding of how serious what these guys are doing is. This isn’t driving in an oval for hours making left turns. Not to knock NASCAR but it is, at the end of the day, driving a car, which most people know how to do. No this is a specialized skill that very few men on earth possess. To skate at that level is to constantly run the risk of severe injury. I applaud anyone who drops in on any of the mega ramps. Hopefully, one day X Games viewers will do the same—when skaters land their tricks, not just when they fall.