This was the first year I attended the Soul Bowl. I had always heard so much about it, so I sent in for credentials two days after the deadline. By God's grace, I was approved!

The ladies kicked off the competition weekend on Friday. Cara-Beth tore it up and grabbed first with huge lien and les twist hip transfers and inverts. Jen O'Brien was able to take second with some high frontside airs and smooth backside ollies. Third place went to the youngster from Chino, CA, Apryl Woodcock. Big airs, lien to tails, stalefish, little invert fakies and the list goes on and on. After the ladies charged up the crowd, they moved into the two Masters categories.

It was great to see the Masters and Grand Masters competitions. Everybody was ripping the bowl. The Gringo skate team came out in force with Gutierrez, Fillion and Chasen. Schneer busted out a couple of his signature ho hos. DP was charging hard just like always. T-Mag was huckin' 540s at 40+ years old. Astorga killed. Schroeder was flying around the bowl like a mack truck. Staab was smooth and still busts out backside ollies head-high.

The cool part to see was that everybody looked like they had a lot of fun.

The Young Guns came out blazing. Bruno killed the entire bowl. Benji wrecks everything he skates and his bundle of tricks landed him second. The MVP of the weekend, in my opinion was Steve Salisian. His runs were long and fast with some pretty gnarly tricks, including fs invert reverts and smooth fs smith reverts.

The team competition was a new addition this year and turned out to be quite a show. Team Moffett threw down with doubles and triples, but didn't have enough points in the end to take down Team Dove.

Another great contest in sunny southern cali. Thanks to Bank of the West for letting me shoot and to all the skaters who make me want to keep shooting.