Pompiaera! Careful..It's Contagious!

Happy Labor Day! I'm sitting here at the command center at our Longboard Loft here in Manhattans Lower East Side...so I'm not sure of the significance of todays holiday on me. But my life has been a holiday for quite some time with weekdays and weekends melting together. I hardly know what time it is during the day and at this point I can get things done just as easily in the dark as in the light..Though personally I like getting it on with the lights on. You know..look into your eyes and all. But I digress.

So the Bustin Crew is back from Puerto Rico! I've been asked quite a few times how was the experience and the best word I can find to sum it up is bliss. Don't get me wrong..there were definite parts that I could have done without. Like sharing two hotel rooms with fifteen to twenty skaters or being so excited to skate the twenty-six mile Adrenalina Marathon only to have it start pouring as soon as the announcer shouted go. But then again these things also helped make this quite a memorable trip. I did make sure I had a bed and only had to share it with my brother for some of the nights and manage to keep the bedroom relatively clean. I can be a bit O.C.D. and a bit of a diva at times but I toned it down as much as I could.

And there was nothing I could do about the rain, everyone had to deal with the same conditions and I'm sure I everyone waiting at that first turn enjoyed seeing riders continually  bust their ass. By the last loop I was kicking my board and calling it all sorts of names. All in all the race was pretty epic and turned out to be the best of the tour to date. Congrats to the homie and my fellow team rider Kiefer Dixon for surprising a lot of people in the distance community and taking first. He also somehow managed in the eight days we were there to become the best freerider in NYC. Pause...The first part was serious but the last was a joke...if we laugh at ourselves it won't matter when others join in. I was also seriously impressed by my teammate Cami "Beast"'s performance. She was in first for the female division for most of the race until her asthma escalated out of control. She managed to finish the race with a strong second after passing out during the course and finishing the remaining laps even though paramedics insisted she stop and link up to the oxygen tank. We had managed to track down her pump but it was too late for that to help. This girl looked like a wet pasta noodle pushing her board and clearly showed signs of dementia but she refused to stop. My team is amazing!

The rest of the trip was absolutely amazing. I learned a little more Spanish, though not enough to say all the dirty things on my mind, and we met some cool locals that really made the trip for us. Luis Marrero, Noishh Boom, Paulette Polosh and many more..you guys rock, thanks for making us all feel at home. They helped get us out of tourist central and showed us some pretty cool spots on the west side of the Island. The locals of course are all insanely skilled and are totally comfortable bombing  sketch streets. The roads were smooth but narrow with cars flying up/down the middle. I actually came within a hair's width of kissing a tire while in a tuck down this one run! Good times though.

Damn! So much more that went on that I want to say but don't want you guys to get bored. Like the crew doing a demo for underprivileged youths, skinny-dipping on the beach, jam sessions in front of the hotel, Cami beating up most of the guys on our trip, Jeff being molested by underage girls(only with their eyes), coming in a room to find my brother butt-naked and face down..you ask him the details, exploring the beach late-night until being too creeped out by what was in the water and crawling over our feet, Sanchez being comatose after trying the local concoctions, Hippix got some 'ish on his lip after spending an evening with a local bartender. I'm not saying they were related but I'm implying they might be. And the stories go on.

Thanks to Adrenalina for hosting and promoting such a great event. The island was full of support and we felt very welcomed. And thanks to Bustin Boards for supporting us. Pompiaera means Stoke!