By: Paul Zitzer  - I’m about to step way out on a controversial limb here, but here goes. The Gatorade Free Flow Tour Finals in SLC was the best display of amateur competitive skateboarding that I’ve ever witnessed. While on the surface that may not really sound all that controversial, you’ve gotta take into account my something like 10 trips to the am contest of all am contests: The Tampa Am. I can hear the collective gasp already... “Blasphemy! How could anything ever be better than Tampa Am!?” Well, hear me out for a minute. Sure, Tampa attracts some of the biggest names in amateur skateboarding, who are known for having the best video parts and most lucrative contracts and all of that, but that being said, big names and fat checks are not always synonymous with staying on one’s skateboard under timed/judged conditions. But I’ll tell you what is: 41 kids from every corner of the country who, before they could get to SLC, actually had to prove that they were capable of throwing down in the not-always-conducive-to-throwing-down contest setting, by winning the qualifier in their neck of the woods.

Let’s face it, when you show up for a contest, like this one for example, you have to get used to a whole new course, with limited practice time that's shared with a million other kids. And that's only a the beginning: a million other things are going on around you, like Neal Hendrix doing his Fuel TV shtick in front of the cameras, random news reporter types asking you all sorts of stuff about what your scene's like back home in Paducah, security guys checking your credentials, camera guys and their 300 foot cables standing wherever it is you’re about to land, and so on. It takes a certain type of kid to be able to show up and roll with all of these punches, and the GFFT seems to have found them all and shipped them in. Oh, and just to be clear, these kids did one heckavalotmore than just stay on their boards.

So, I’m standing next to a Mr. T lookalike and waiting for the GFFT finals to begin when it hits me: Mr. T and the A-Team was cancelled and off the air probably like ten years before most of these Gatorade Free Flower-s were ever born. I pity the fool that can kickflip back lip a rail and never got to see Hannibal and co. bring a plan together. But oh well. I’m guessing the average age of the kids that won the qualifier in their town, flew to SLC then made it through the semi finals and into the final 12 is probably about 14, maybe 15, which makes me think back to Ryan Scheckler winning the X-Games for the first time at age 13. The way I see it, each and every one of these kids is skating at around the same or even a higher level as little Shecks was skating at the same age. So lets fast forward five years to when all of these kids are 19. I’m thinking we’re going to be looking at a dozen or even more potential Dew Tour champs with Sheckleresque talent. Which begs the obvious question, are we looking at 12 reality TV stars of the future? Only time will tell.

Before the finals began I hadn’t really heard of any of these kids. But now that I have let me fill you in on what I learned about each one, in the order that they qualified….

Alex Longcamp, 16. Aurora, Indiana. Let’s use Alex as a reminder of the difference between pros and ams these days. And it ain’t much. Basically, besides the ams being a little shorter and scrawnier, the biggest difference is that they haven’t undertaken the painstaking process of cultivating their images to the extent of the pros. So while Alex had all the kickflip front boards and the 270 lipslides necessary to hang with the big boys, all he needs now is a Mohawk, or a nape cape, or a leather jacket or a pork pie hat or something. 4th place.

Curto Caedyn, 14. Redondo Beach, California. He stood out by wearing these really tight cut off jean shorts. Sometimes that’s all it takes. But then he went ahead and shredded the course with back lips, noseblunt slides, and his coupe de grace was a backside lipslide UP the Nike 6.0 upledge…and the thing was steep. 10th place.

Alec Majerus, 14, Rochester, Minnesota. Think about this, Ryan Decenzo is currently second place in points on the Dew Tour, and he didn’t start skating unil he was 16. So, with kids like Alex doing kickflip front feebles, and kickflip back smiths at 14, what does that say? I say it says a lot. 8th place.

Chase Webb, 14, Oceanside, California. Here’s something I noticed about these kids. The younger they are and the smaller they are, the more they can flip their board and the more they land back on it. Weird. Chase proved the point with kickflip front boards and kickflip 50-50s every try. 7th place.

Anthony Estrada, 16, Ontario CA. It would be great if Anthony was the son of Eric Estrada from C.H.I.P.s…another TV show that these kids are way to young to have even heard of. He could be like the next P-Rod, with the only problem being that A-Est for a name isn’t going to fly. I don’t think Anthony had the finals he was hoping for, but he still killed it. 11th place.

Tyson Bowerbank, 14. Sandy, UT. I don’t know exactly where Sandy is in relation to SLC, but this kid played the part of hometown hero like a champ, giving the crowd exactly what they came for. For example, frontside feebles, kickflip front boards, and 360 ollies up, over and down every obstacle on the course. Get this, in the final six man jam he sort of half made a frontside lipslide across the ledge to backside 270 flip to fakie…whawhat? Even though it was sort of a bail it was still crazy. He’ll make it clean in his next video part I’m sure. 5th place.

Aaron, Collier, 18. Lake Mary, FL. It’s funny that an 18 year old was the oldest kid on the course…I mean man on the course. He can, after all, join the army now. But is he too old to bother? Well, taking into account that Jordan Hoffart turned pro at 24, just moments before triggering official man-am status, I guess that gives Aaron a solid 5 years at least before he has to worry about it. And besides, he rips!!! How about cab lipslides down the big rail? That’s what I thought. 12th place.

Ryan Thompson, 13. Katy, TX. For being the youngest kid to make it all the way to the finals of the Finals, “big ups!” (Are the kids still saying that these days?) Anyway, he skated like a 20 year old with a relaxed, mildly lanky style. His intro run was completely amazing, but he struggled in the jam I guess. My favorite trick of Ryan's was a frontside smith on the flat bar popped over to front board. He also front blunted down the Hubba. I noticed the judges were scoring these guys like they were pro already…Ryan’s perfect run only got him a 79… 9th place.

Brendon Villanueva, 15. Poway, CA. I know I already mentioned Hoffart once, and not to dwell too much on the guy, but after the contest he said something to the effect that he wouldn’t even TRY half the tricks the Gatorade Free Flow kids were landing. That’s high praise. He might have been talking about tricks like Brendon’s double flip over the picnic table…or maybe it was his hardflip down the double set…or maybe it was his–oh you get the idea. 3rd place.

CJ Dixon, 17. Cocoa Beach, FL. Going into the final, top-six-man jam I was a little worried about the kids that had JUST finished skating in the heat two jam. I was thinking maybe they might all be too tired and out of breath to make it through back to back jams. But then I remembered that these kids are kids. And they’re hungry. Case in point, CJ Dixon. 360 flip lipslides, frontside big spins, nollie noseblunt slides.  And he was even sort of injured. Like that could slow these kids down. He killed it. 6th place.

Raymond Macken, 15. Gerroa, AUS. I don’t know where this kid’s been hiding but he’s a maniac. With a leopard/zebra print type hoodie thing happening he was easy to spot, but that was just the beginning. He had the best individual run, but “lost” it in the final round. Basically he did everything, but my hands down fave was the back smith up the 6.0 ledge to backside 180 out. Well, maybe it’s a tie between that and his kickflip back smith. Oh, and then there’s the front smith up the 6.0 ledge to kickflip…and then there’s the…2nd place.

Jack Olson, 15. St Louis Park, MN. Apparently Jackie-O had to go to three different Gatorade Free Flow stops to win a trip into the finals. Which is pretty shocking to think about if you’ve seen him skate. Get this, he qualified first out of the 50 or so kids in the prelims, and then ended up winning the whole deal. So it’s like he won two times in one day. He has consistency cubed. His switch Barley grind down the rail was maybe not the hardest trick for him, but one of the raddest tricks he did. Plus switch 270 lipslides, and then, a switch stance 270 to frontside bluntslide on the flat rail. So kids, study up, because that’s what it takes to win the GFFT in 2009. What in the world is it going to take next year?