Tagged "team trip"


Tilt Takes Toronto

Posted by Christopher Martin on

Photography by: Chris Martin, Collin Snoek, Jordan Jasa & Christian Dean. Copywriting by: Chris Martin, Christian Dean & Jordan Jasa.

This trip took a lot of preparation from the start. We went back and forth about going to a midwest town or going somewhere rad like Puerto Rico or Montreal. After a month of back and forth it was pretty unanimous, Canada it was. Collin and Chris did a decent amount of planning the route which later turned into a full blown Toronto spot list to break up the drive to Montreal. In addition to the 12 hours spent on virtual walks using google, we needed a van since we sold our last one during the move. Collin went in and picked the sketchiest, cheapest van we could find which was a Ford Diesel that got nicknamed the “Fuckit Bucket.” A roof rack was built and some minor rigging was done. Tilt was as ready as could be to hit the road in hopes to make it into Canada at the very least.

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We stopped every chance we could on the way up because the van didn’t have AC and had a hole or two in the fire wall which made it hotter inside than outside. This trip was during the crazy heat wave that hit the Midwest.

Tilt Takes Toronto

Our first Canadian adventure took place before we even got into the country. Collin was really on the team about being prepared to cross the border. So when we got to the checkpoint, the team sat and chilled while Collin did the talking with the agent. Sure enough, he managed to answer them in an unnecessarily sketchy way (he got tripped up when they asked if anyone was gonna be making money on the trip) and so we got directed off to the side, into no man's land for further investigation. We piled into a waiting room, did some waiting, got caught up on the olympic tennis standings, they double checked Jon's identity, gave us back our passports and we were on our way.

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Collin had to pee and eat so we pulled off the freeway to find a shaded spot which turned into an out in the open spot in between two cornfields. Not an ideal situation but turned out to be fun. Jordan was very confused because to him, being from small town Iowa, it seemed he had not traveled very far from home despite the hours we had already driven.

Tilt Takes Toronto

Our campsite was a very interesting situation. Somehow we managed to turn a five hour drive into eight so we got to the campground as the sun was setting. We all stayed in our seats while Collin did the talking since there were nine smelly dudes in a van. At first they told us we couldn't stay because they were full but somehow Collin got us in. Where there is a Collin, there is a way. We ended up with a solid group campsite that had all the room and was away from everyone else. It was perfect.

Half the team set up Josh's aunt's humongous tent while the other half went to go find beer from a local grocery store. Turns out you can't do that- they don't sell beer at grocery stores in Canada. But we ended up with 2 liter bottles of cider and wine made by Growers. To be honest it wasn't bad and it set things off in the right way...or so we thought.

Tilt Takes Toronto

The next morning, Collin noticed the power steering was leaking. While he still had fluid in the system, he made the decision to take it to the shop. As that was happening, we were told we would have to move our tents. It took about 45 minutes to set the big tent up so there was no way we were gonna tear it down. Everyone grabbed an end and carried it to our new site.

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Since the van was still being worked on, Issac, Jon and Chris decided to go for a swim in the river and wash off as others just laid around, skated, edited photos or drank the left over Growers.

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At last, the van was here to save us from going insane from boredom. On our way to our first spot, we saw a really long flat bar. Pulled a U-turn and seshed it till a security guard came an hour later. He was extremely polite and so was the old Italian man that promised he didn’t call the cops but he did want us to go. We were not used to this; turns out the stereotype is true.

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Still on our way to our “first” spot, we saw an apartment complex that had some sweet roof to ride on along with some more flat rails. Both Jon and Issac got clips as the residents came out to watch. Everyone was so intrigued and very confused as they rooted the team on.

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Finally, we made it to our “first” spot which ended up being our last spot. This was a school that was really a skatepark. It was a lot of fun getting creative with the bank and rail lines.

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As the whole team was focused on one part, Jon was looking at a really long kinked rail. It was as long or longer than the one Issac attempted in Grand Rapids a year or so back (think thrash resistant ad). Jon attempted this rail making it past the kink a couple of times but the sun was going down along with Jon’s energy. Issac gave him some words from his experience and the sesh came to an end. Some things are just too gnarly and not worth killing yourself on the first day of riding.

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The next day we all woke up at different times and waited to move the tent again. It was insane that we couldn’t stay in the same spot more than a night. The ladies at the spot we were suppose to move to were taking their sweet time. Chris went over to talk to them and after he finished asking them when they were going to leave, they responded in french. That’s when we knew we were screwed and would have to wait till noon which is when they had to leave.

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On the third day, we hit up a park in Toronto and met up with local rider Ethan Kirk. We started to make plans to ride spots downtown when storm clouds began to roll in. We were forced to make a choice: drive back to the campground to grab our stuff in case it rained, or take a chance to be able to get clips. We compromised and so Jordan, Christian, and Smukal headed to the city with the homies while the rest of the squad drove back. It was a good thing, because our rain tarp wasn't on our tent and so it was filling up with water. The boys went out and bought towels and took everything to a laundromat to dry what was wet.

Tilt Takes Toronto

While the rest of the team was out at the park warming up, Dylan and Chris got dropped off at the hospital. Dylan was battling some sharp stomach pains before the street jam but they went away. They came back this day and he was seriously thinking about flying home. After a couple hours running tests at the hospital he was released. With questions still unanswered, the two of them were ready to be picked up but things didn't go as smoothly as they hoped. Turns out half the crew had their hands full and the two were left stranded downtown with no scooters for 12 hours.

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Meanwhile, those of us in the city were able to cruise the city and manage to get some clips, but not before getting drenched in the rain. We were at this famous manny pad spot when it started pouring buckets. We were able to find cover under a building right there, but must have sat there for an hour at least. After a while of that, Jordan said screw it and started riding in the rain, getting some rad shots anyway. After a sesh of doing tricks over a little sign that was there, we headed to this underground food court/parking garage. We filmed some jibs down there but got kicked out, and finally it was dry enough for us to keep riding outside.

Tilt Takes Toronto

So while cruising we came across this flooded underpass that was blocked off by the cops. Some idiot taxi driver had gotten stuck in the water and the fire department was pumping water out. We also saw two brave bicyclists ride directly through the knee high water with no issues, while Christian was setting up to film a trick. We ended up having a successful night and the van picked us up right after the camera batteries died.

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We started the next day off like we started every day in Canada; fight ourselves awake through the sore muscles from yesterday's riding, scavenge for the nearest Starbucks to get our caffeine fix, then load up the van and head towards the day’s first spot. Following the pattern of this trip the first spot of this day wasn't on our list, but one we spotted from the road while driving. It was a crusty, transitioned bank to concrete wall. After getting a few wallrides in, the lady who owned the house behind the wall stuck her head out the window and began to heckle us. She was angry about how loud we were being, and that she and her kids were trying to sleep. We tried to reason with her, but she wasn’t having it. A few minutes later, a rather sketchy dude started walking our way from down the road. He was getting really hyped on us and was asking us to do the wallride and other random tricks on our scooter. After he saw the lady yelling at us, he started yelling back at her telling her to leave us alone and go back inside. It was hilarious to watch this random guy defend us against the old lady yelling out her window. He was definitely the homie.

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After getting a few clips at the wallride spot, we continued on to our neverlasting list of spots. A few spots that we showed up to ended up being duds, which wasn’t ideal. On our way driving to (hopefully) the next successful spot, we came across a green mellow double kinked rail. The rail seemed too good to be true, and that’s exactly what it was. We’ve never seen a rail that wobbled more in our entire lives. Jona was eyeing up the rail and deciding if it was even worth hitting. After only a couple tries, he managed to suicide FS lipslide through both kinks. Issac got his back with a FS 5-0, which shouldn’t have been possible on the rail. While Issac and Jona were riding the green rail, Jon had his sights set on a steep wall-rail against the building. He got a perfect BS 5-0, then we packed up and headed to the next destination.

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The next spot was definitely one of a kind. It had a slightly curved handicap rail that went along the sidewalk, then abruptly turns into a short stairset rail. In the middle and off to the side of the rail was a random circular manual pad. While half the crew took a pit stop at the Tim Horton’s next to the spot, Tom was trying to boardslide the whole rail. After battling the rail for about an hour, we decided that the sharp curve at the end was impossible to slide through. Dylan started looking at the manual pad, and began to try a FS 180 fakie manual. After getting close multiple times and then almost calling quits, he managed to pull the fakie manual across the pad. This spot was definitely better looking in the pictures, and a lot more difficult to ride than we were anticipating. We rallied up the crew and headed off to the next spot.

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We made it to a famous courtyard that everyone was having a good time at. Both Jona and Jordan got their tricks first while Issac and Jon screwed around at the spot. Jon ended up falling on his pre-existing scab that was getting infected. Issac ended up landing some pretty cool things like a 180 to fakie 50-50.

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Jona started going at a bar 50 and Issac soon started trying a whip 50. Tom had been attempting a wallride 50 the entire time. It was fun watching three of the riders add their own style on a single spot. This spot sort of resembled the time when Tom battled the wallride smith in Pittsburgh back in 2014. All he needed was that perfect land and he had it but that never came this time around. Jona and Christian were the only ones that rode away from this spot.

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Toronto seems to be full of apartment complexes with rideable rails. We stumbled on this screwed up kink that dropped off into the flat part. Both Tom and Issac were playing around with it. Once everyone got set up to capture what was about to happen, Issac went for it. First time he hit the flat super violently and sort of shot out. He grabs his scooter and knows he has it. Second try he absorbs the kink much better and rides away. Everyone was in shock, like it was really that easy?

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This pool was really rad but not forgiving. There was a lot of interesting lines to nail down and we spent a decent amount of time at this park.

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The crew split up a little bit again, with most of us splitting off to ride and the other few to chill in the van. The riding crew started making their way towards the city, just cruising for spots. The first one we found was this building with banked wallrides on the side. A fire hydrant and bike rack spiced it up, and we ended up staying there for quite a while clocking clips. The crew continued on, with mild success.

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We ended up meeting on a random street away from the traffic which turned into a perfect chill spot as the sun was setting. Some girls came by and said they wanted their photo taken so they posed by the van. Like usual, Dylan found a spot in the nearest alley to hit. Both him and Jordan ended up getting something on it.

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We came up on this brand new school with a few pretty good spots. Tom decided to send it down a double kink even though it was beginning to rain lightly. He kept getting closer and closer, but it started to rain harder between tries. He landed the rail twice but didn’t get his tailwhip out. We finally had to call it quits since his griptape became useless and he kept slipping out on the rail. He managed to cheat death more than once on this one.

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While driving around deciding what to do, we stopped to check out a rail in front of a house. It must have been garbage pickup day, because there were boxes of clothes and other random stuff on the sidewalk. Issac copped a flannel robe and rocked it for the rest of the day. We took shelter at a nearby skatepark that was placed under a bridge. The park was moderately packed with skateboarders and small children snaking their way throughout the ramps. Even with spirits at an all time low because of the rain, we managed to have a good sesh at the small and quirky skatepark.

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This was our second time at this spot. Jona had a line he really wanted to get on these super smooth ledges. We showed up with no wax and we knew it was going to be a problem. As Jona tried to land it without the wax, some people cruised to a store to get some wax for him. As they showed up with the wax, we were getting kicked out. Jona was down to try it while they called the cops but then a guy with his dog stood in front of the ledge. As we were leaving, they all started taking pictures of us on their phones like they were going to do something with it. Every time we got kicked out of spots, everyone was really nice and apologetic. This was our least pleasant kick out but even then, they were still polite. It was so weird, Coming from America, we are used to people being rude and hostile.

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We showed up to the last spot (this was the 2nd time we came here, we ruled it out as an irrelevant spot the 1st time) and we pushed around the school. The back of the school had a large bank, with multiple handrails scattered throughout. One particular rail was a triple kink with an extended flat at the bottom. This was a monster of a rail and seemed anything but possible.

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We started looking around a bit more, and Christian had his eye on a roof to dumpster hop. He climbed up to the top to get a better look, and decided he wanted to try it. Christian usually likes to keep his wheels close to the ground, so this one was a little out of his comfort zone. After a few minutes of hyping himself up, he got the dumpster ride first try.

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Issac started looking at the monster rail again. It had everything going against him; it was tall, the downs were steep, the kinks were harsh, and it was concrete on both sides. There were no safe-havens on this rail. He told himself he wasn’t doing it being content with the other kink he already landed a couple days ago. Chris came up and sat next to him, giving a little nudge towards him hitting the rail. He explained himself and rode away. He had valid points.

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After a couple run-ups and some encouragement from the boys, Issac started to try and slide the giant kinked rail. He kept getting closer with each try. He would make it to the end of the rail almost every attempt, but then get sent by the extended flat on the bottom.

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After about 10 attempts, Issac landed a proper boardslide all the way through the extended section of the rail. Some people tried to hold back their excitement but it was rather hard to contain our excitement for him. It was a perfect way to end the trip. We ended up making it to a bar for some pizza and adult beverages where Collin treated the team for a great time. The car ride back to the motel was a musical with hit after hit as everyone in the van sang at the top of their lungs for 30 minutes. Spirits were high and the last thing we were thinking about was the 6 hour drive back to the shop.

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Overall, things could have gone smoother for Tilt's first international trip. We didn't make it to our original destination, Dylan was out sick for a couple days, the whole camping thing was more or less a disaster, we were hit by rain, the van was hotter than the Devil's asshole, and buying beer at night after a long day of riding when you just want to chill? Easier said than done. But hey, it wouldn't be a Tilt trip without something going wrong. Even with the setbacks, we were able to film an awesome video. That's what makes this team so special- the ability to persevere, have fun, and work hard to create something the entire community can enjoy. We hope you enjoyed Tilt Takes Toronto, and we'll see you on the next trip!

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Rusted Never Busted : Cleveland

Posted by Christopher Martin on

We headed out early the next day, hit our classic bagel shop and then we were off to Cleveland. The first Cleveland spot was this huge DIY with quarters everywhere. It was sketchy, but also had some of the best DIY tranny we’ve seen. There was a dude living there who made us help out with the work in exchange for letting us ride. At first he questioned every trick we did to make sure we didn’t destroy the copping but then he realized we knew how to ride.

Next up was a dam in the back of a cemetery. It really confuses us sometimes how Dylan finds these spots. Once we get there some of us realized this was in the vans movie. Tom and Issac weren’t too hyped at the spot and felt like they couldn’t do much but then they pulled some tricks out like they normally do. Tom got a downside fullwhip, Issac pulled a downside fingerwhip and Dylan stuck a 360 over the guard rail.

One of the most fun Cleveland spots was the infamous brown banks. What was apparently a skatepark way back in the day is now ridden as a street spot. While TomK and Erik filmed real clips, Jon and Issac were getting barefoot clips and hopping a fence to get into the pool to get their hair wet.

It was pretty hard to shoot photos here and Josh was already trying to claim his spot to film so Chris slid in-between his legs and snapped some pics. It definitely looked weird but whatever you got to do to get the shot.

It’s always an experience going to spots in the projects. We hit up this weird old fountain structure in a school in the ghetto because it has a really good fly-out step-up. This spot is notorious for crews getting jacked and full camera setups being stolen. We figured we had a big enough crew that no one should mess with us. It wasn’t long before hordes of bored, unsupervised children came to see what was happening.

We had to keep a close watch on our scooters because they were all asking to ride them. A couple of the older kids were actually really cool and fascinated with the riding but the majority of them stayed in the way. One kid was riding around on his own little electric ATV. Unfortunately, he didn’t let us give it a go. He did, however, let Collin skitch the back of it and took him for a spin.

The last spot of the trip was the banger spot. We showed up to this rail hop right as the sun was setting right next to the Browns Stadium. There were some other rails there, but we weren’t sure what was really doable. Sure enough, the crew started throwing down. Jona hits the double rail hop into bank while Issac does a lipslide down the 14 stair handrail.

Tom got funky with a boardslide through the kink hop over and threads the needle while dodging freeway on ramp traffic. Jon ended the trip with a huge fingerwhip over a bar height rail to a six foot drop. Other Cleveland highlights include getting ice cream at a shop converted from a movie theater, celebrating Ralph’s birthday at the hotel, and extreme pool chair jumping at the hotel. It was one good ass trip.

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Rusted Never Busted : Detroit

Posted by Christopher Martin on

Every year before the Chicago Street Jam, the boys pack up in the van and take a trip somewhere around the Midwest. The entire crew was in town for this one which was a nice treat. Since it takes a whole day to gather up everyone, some of us cruised the city and hit up a couple parks with some friends. As the day continued, the crew got bigger. We caught a nice sunset sesh at burnham and headed back to Mokena.

Half the crew stayed at Shane’s apartment, our sales manager and the rest stayed at Collin’s. There was limited couch/floor space and it was a nice night so Jon and Issac decided to sleep on the balcony. Once everyone was up and fed, we met at the shop, snagged any last minutes parts, packed up the van and hit the road.

This year we decided to hit the Rust Belt cities of Detroit and Cleveland. The crew consisted of Jon Archer, Erik Feenstra, Jona Humbel, Jordan Jasa, Dylan Kasson, Tom Kvilhaug, Chris Martin, Ralph McMoran, Issac Miller, Josh Smukal, and Collin Snoek. After hours of driving, we were just minutes from Detroit and we still hadn’t nailed down a hotel to stay at. This is pretty normal for us for some reason. As one person drives, the other books a cheap hotel, or finds a place to eat, or locates the next spot.

As we neared the first spot we knew right away the neighborhood we were in was sketchy. The gas station we stopped at for drinks had a couple cops posted up and the checkout area used a sort of rotating lazy susan for the teller to take your money, because the rest of the counter had bulletproof glass separating the customers from the teller. We expected a bit of sketchiness, but what we didn’t expect was the wind!

The first spot had some of the gnarliest wind we have ever rode in. But the spot was so good that it didn’t even matter. Northwestern High School is filled with crazy banks, ledges, and transfers everywhere. You could start at one end, carve one wall for speed, then push up to the biggest wall with perfect tranny at the bottom to hit your trick. It wasn’t long before the tricks started going down.

Tom K switched things up by hitting the wallride off the side of the bank, and almost whipped into it. He got the whip in a couple of times but just couldn’t pull out of it to land. Some local homies showed up to the spot and helped us get into the abandoned building across the street so we could shoot some b-roll and explore. Tom K eventually broke his deck and we were outtie to the next spot.

This was one spot we knew some tricks would go down. It was a perfect 9 stair rail down a bank at some ATV dealership. This thing was seriously so low, it was like a park rail. So immediately Tom and Jon started trying tricks up it.

People were looking at tricks over the rail into the bank too. As Jona was working his way up to back sugarcaning down it, Tom and Jon both laced their tricks and Issac was able to lock into a backside over 5050.

The sun was beginning to set so we decided to make our way into the city for some extra light to see if we could find anything. We ended up at a random street by the river that of course Dylan knew a spot on, so we scoped it out. The place looked insane and had banks, tables, ledges, stairs, even manny pads.

This place looked like fun and was all downhill, but a lot of the obstacles had some minor flaw to it that made it hard to ride. The whole team was pretty tired so we decided to just head back to our hotel that was behind Hooters.

After breakfast and a round of crabapple dodgeball (which Chris lost), we hit up a really cool DIY. Everyone got clips despite the soaring temps. Some people came out and took some modeling photos which was strange because that DIY was just in a basketball court next to an empty field. The local homies ended up meeting up with us and we hit the next spot but not before we had some pizza at a bowling alley.

Once we finished we headed over to the abandoned building with a sunken in 2nd floor that created the perfect tranny you could hit. There was also a sketchy bump to rail and a random cinderblock ledge. This spot was low key famous. DVS, Rome SDS and some ski company have all ridden here. While some people were trying to film tricks, others went and explored around the building, and even got up on the roof for a bird’s eye view.

After leaving the warehouse we ended up driving up and down random roads to see if we could find anything. We did end up finding a wallride gap to sidewalk that Dylan attempted. It had a weird run up and of course Dylan had to go full speed at it.

We were there for about 30-40 minutes before he started getting sun sickness and had to call it otherwise he would of been drained the rest of the day. While we were there some of the crew noticed a 5 kinked rail that we would later come back to.

We continued to drive up and down roads and stumbled on another small DIY which was right next to another abandoned building.

Some of the team rode and some of us explored the building trying to find a way up on top of the roof to get a good B-roll shot but there wasn’t a way.

We headed to downtown Detroit, to Hart Plaza. We did get the kickout but not before Tom was able to sticker slap one of the sculptures. After driving around for a long time not finding anything, we came up on a red bump to bar outside a local youth boxing gym. After about five minutes there a dude in a van drove up on us super-fast, and started yelling at us to leave. He was saying how he owned the place and it was for the kids, and that they just painted the rail that Jon was about to grind. Over and over the guy yelled, “I did it for the kids” while he kicked Jon’s backpack and got in his face.

Jon just replied with, “chill man, I like the kids too”. We were fine with leaving but the dude was being unreasonably angry and nearly fought Jon. It was a tad scary because we were learning how sketchy Detroit can be and we didn’t know if this guy had a gun or anything. Everything happened pretty fast so we packed the van up and drove off while he was taking pictures of our license plate. We quickly realized Dylan wasn’t in the van and we had to go drive up and down the roads and try to find him and hope this guy wasn’t following us.

Once we got Dylan in the van we headed to the 5 kinked rail from earlier. Tom scoped it out and turns around and says, “Yeah I’ll hit it. This blew some of our minds how casual he said it. We got the lights out and the kids started flocking to us. Since the kids have nothing better to do, they come hangout with 11 dudes traveling in a van. These kids were a pain because they kept getting in the shot or using the rail as a gymnastics station. Tom gets about 10 or so tries into it and makes it past the 3rd kink but slips out.

The whole team gets hyped but shortly we get kicked out by a janitor. She said she already called the cops. Tom tries 2 more times and realizes he needs more time and not to be under pressure so we pack up and go. On our way back to the hotel we find a cool little manny pad and 4 or 5 benches sitting around it. Dylan and Jordan end up getting clips while some of the team ventures off and grabs some tasty beverages to bring back to the van for everyone.

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Cali 2015

Posted by Christopher Martin on

Flying away from the snow, Jordan, Erik, and Dylan arrived at Ralphs house. Well, Erik ended up missing his flight but the crew picked him up the next morning at the airport. Alex Steadman drove up from Arizona. It was a warm day and without a care in the world, they zoomed out of Ralph’s neighborhood. As they accelerated on the freeway ramp they were met with a gridlocked highway, it was official, they were in LA. They quickly realized their next ten days were going to be sitting in a car. This wasn’t there only problem. They arrived on a Friday and were heading out ten days later on a Monday. This allowed four weekend days and six weekdays. Regardless of the city, riding street on weekdays is tough. People are working, walking, driving, and sitting on all the spots you are trying to ride. You also cant forget other riders. Jordan ended up posting a spot on instagram and before they knew it, 20 riders were there to hang out. This is cool and all but it always ends in a quick bust or too many people riding the same spot which is hard for filming. With that said, they thought of spots that simply didn’t have anybody there at anytime. The most common types of spots like this are ditches, DIY’s, abandoned businesses, and businesses after hours.

When you want to go to a spot in Los Angeles there are a lot of factors that dictate if you should go to it other than the desire. The major issue being if the spot stills exists. There has been many times when the team thinks they are in the wrong place, but the spot is wiped from the earth because they would rather demolish it instead of cap it. If they go to a well-known spot on a weekend, it is almost guaranteed there are multiple skate crews filming for their top-secret ground breaking video part. Spring break for schools is never a consistent time country wide like Christmas break so the team would search online to see if they were on break before going to a school. Erik and Ralph were in need of the most footage to finish their parts so the priority was on them. Everyday the team left the house at 11am and didn’t get back until 11pm. It was an intense trip with the non stop driving and riding all over Southern California. They all emerged with some more clips to put on the timeline, and photos to add to this article. This was the last official filming trip for Tilt 2 so what was filmed is the final material that will go into the film. The trip was successful because through all the setbacks that occur navigating the real world as a street rider, they managed to focus on the goal of finishing the video.

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TILT IN THE BAY : PART TWO

Posted by Christopher Martin on

Day three in San Francisco was the filming of the Tilt 2 intro. We ghetto rigged the back door to stay open while Chris held onto the camera/tripod and filmed while Collin drove. If you have ever been in the van with Collin you know thats gnarly and we even had to blow a stop sign going about 20mph to get it. Once we split up for the day it went great for the Tilt van getting some good action but for the rental car it went way south. Lots of driving around and spot bust so they ended up checking out the golden gate bridge. They did scope out a killer school for after sunset sesh. We all met at the school that night which was in a neighborhood. Lighting it up was going to be risky but we felt like it was worth it. A lot of people were either watching us ride through their windows or hanging out on the street corners confused but intrigued. A couple cleaning people went into the school while we had the lights up and they seemed concerned but didn’t want to confront us. We hopped the fence in the back and lit up a 17 stair. Issac got the clip 1st try and the whole team started yelling in excitement. Tom started lining up for his trick but some lady drove by and said she called the cops and one of the cleaning guys came out and said we had to go. I have never seen a set up get torn down so quickly and packed in the van. We are talking lights, light stands, generator, gas can, extension cords, two HVX’s, 7D and flash all over a 10ft fence in about 90 seconds. The next day we drove around together hitting the same spots and getting portraits of the team for the website. We did a quick stop at Wallenberg just to peep it. There were a bunch of kids practicing basketball and a random yoga group but before we knew it, Issac was throwing himself down the set. Re-opened his hand again but in the end he landed the trick. Three times might I add but they weren’t as clean the first two times.

After Wallenberg we hit up Twin Peaks to check it out and see the sunset and take some photos. Mostly everyone still wanted to ride so we drove around for a bit and ended up at a ledge/mani pad. The main reason was for Jordan to get a clip but everyone else ended up getting something but he couldn’t pull through. We went back to the hotel, ate some pizza and went over the 2015 spring/summer apparel drop. By time we finished up it was close to 2am. Since this was our last night and tomorrow we had a long van ride so some of us decided to stay up all night and go out riding. Ralph didn’t even change out of his pajamas as we hit the streets. It was pretty interesting and fun but holy crap were we tired when that sun came up. On our way back to LA we stopped at Big Sur. Jona was pretty much asleep for the whole thing until we took one of the sketchiest roads up some mountains with vertical drops that would keep us rolling all the way to the ocean if we went off. Jona was not about that life at all. As part of the crew split off at Ralph’s house to hangout and film the other part drove the van back to Chicago with stops in Vegas, Canyonlands National Park, Breckenridge ski resort, Denver and from there we drove straight to the Tilt House. Some things that need to be noted is Collin peeing on people’s houses, actually Collin just peeing where ever he wants. Tom K going through a red light in front of a cop and the cop not doing anything. Going to a school while in session and getting kicked out because Ralph was smoking. The teacher then realized we were riding the spot and then got kicked out for scootering. Blaring Taylor Swift in the van and the whole vehicle rocking back and forth. Erik and Tom both having birthdays during the trip. The team battling to charge their phone inside the van and one hell of a time in the bay.

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