Royal de Chelles

November 05, 2008 @ 5:43 PM - by Sami

Royal de Chelles
Globe and Blind adventures in the side effects of the Cosa Cup
Paris, France, November 2008

Some mornings you wake up with all sorts of ducks flying on this site. You shoot ‘em down and go to brew another cup of coffee.

Ugh! Big up to Alvaro for an awesome mini ramp session last night. Ended up going to San Sebastian and skating the streets after a midnight dinner. Love that shit. Love that town. Love those people. Love that food. Hessu took the first skater of the week trophy. Go buy it son!

But, what the hell happened last weekend in Paris? I think I was in some sort of a jolly cloud with heavy rippers Julien Bechet (now known as Becket), Julien Merour, Eero Anttila and Dany Hamard, spiced up with Raph Brunis, David and Kev the photographers, a few bottles of all sorts of liquor, and the Captain Grego Poissonnier of Globe fame.

Sometimes things don’t go quite according to plan: Blind euro dudes Philipp Schuster, Chris Oliver and Dany Hamard were supposed to fly the flag in the Cosa Cup but first Philipp got a victim of non-French-speaking team management and ended up without the flight tickets (Yeah – I might press some sort of a confirmation button next time). Then, as we were driving up from southern France Chris Oliver called and said he had slammed the previous night and couldn’t even walk to the airport. Two down, still 500 km to go. Willy Simon was skating for Nike and was out of the equation. Raph Brunis jumped into the plane from Barcelona.

We arrived to the Cosa Nostra skatepark sometime after dark and before midnight and proceeded to skate. And what awesome ripping it was. Juliens were totally on fire and a machine called Eero Anttila left mere mortals wondering what the hell was going on.

“My boys are on fire”, bemoaned le Captain Poissonnier.

All sorts of crazy shit was going down. I think Becket was flying his hardflips over the pyramid way onto the flat and doing all sorts of transfer nosegrind hulabaloo. But you shouldn’t do kickflip nosegrinds down a handrail nor even a flatrail on a night before the comp as Merour did. Or bs 180 sw 5-0s down a handrail like Becket.

“Look at my team” says Poissonnier 20 minutes later. Indeed, there they were on the bench next to each other holding their right ankles in a synchronized manner.

Becket would skate no more during the weekend – but use his energy to all sort of side activity - and Merour’s ankle was a swelling question mark.

Next morning and a hell of a hangover. The Cosa Cup is such an awesome event that they have Osteopathy students giving you the feelings and healings. I got on that bed just because of my headache (mistake, the after-effects nearly killed me) as Juliens were treated for their ankles.

The initial verdict was both are out.

So, we mixed up the teams and entered just one team combining Blind with Globe with Eero, Dany, and Raph taking the duties.

Merour anyhow proceeded to smoke enough hash I guess and within an hour was ripping the park saying he wants to skate. At the same time Sam Partaix needed a rider and Julien jumped under the Eastpak banner.

Meanwhile Ivan Rivado decided to slam hard enough to knock himself out of the Volcom team of Alain GTX and Axel Cruysberghschnitzel.

Now, as we were all nicely mixed up without any clever logic the games could begin.

And what games they were. Eero freaked everyone out and Globe/ Blind wiped everyones’ ass on the first day. Merour was skating awesome with Partaix while Axel kept Volcom alive.

The ginger kid Adrien from Rouen was starting to drew attention as Autobahn flew on and on.

Shit was hella tight and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. Even the seven spectators and the Spanish mafia.

Then there was a miniramp contest that was won by Partaix but I’d say we were all winners witnessing such a session.

Yeah yeah. This is total sports commentary of 2008.

I don’t know of any results from that mini session but Axel could’ve been second or third or the ever awesome David Martelleur could’ve been second or fifth (was that fingerflip to tail fs revert on the extension to shut the session) and the little Werner kid was skating AMAZINGLY and could’ve been like fourth or third if this was a comp indeed. Also to be noted a mean backshite smith of the Captain Poissonnier on that extension. Yesss.

Then we stumbled into the Paris night and it was hella tight. (damn I love that word today).

A few hours of sleep somewhere in Paris and we were back in the park. Big thanks to the angel of a receptionist who gave us a lift to the park. Just on time.

There are a few things in France you notice when breathing the air and asking yourself what’s going on:

First of all, they seem to love Phil Collins. The dude is on the radio all the time.

Second is, you don’t get any service anywhere, it is impossible to get a taxi in the smaller areas, it is impossible to get any sort of service and its damn impossible to get cigarettes in a Paris suburb on Sunday. Plus the dudes look mean in Chelles.

YEAH. But that receptionist lady, after we couldn’t get a cab and all the hope was lost and we were well too late, saved the day. I love her to bits. I’d loved her to love me back.

And what a day it was! Comps proceeded. Yess.

I guess it was Globe/Blind vs Vans and the GeeBees got through. Some other drama was developing while the teams of three personnel battled it out.

Zwijsen was there and we realized I’ve left all my messages to his old phone number. Lucky Element. (Reference to the new Kingpin news section).

Then in semis we had the session of the weekend. Ooh whoo uuu aaa. GeeBee vs Volcom. Alain had woken up from coma and Axel was himself, and Hans was skating in place of Rivado doing good. Big up to Hans! Eero absolutely killed the course but fuck it. Some called it a controversial judge call, I called it another cigarette. Volcom went through and Alain’s crailslide on that big wall was pretty epic. In the final Volcom met the total surprise of the weekend, Autobahn, who had won I guess Trauma (to whom Julien Merour really skates but we had mixed the teams pretty good here. Nico Rouquette is by the way the Trauma TM and here goes a hello to the direction of Montpellier).

Yeah, those ginger 360 flips took Autobahn all the way to here, to the final. Such is sport. The final was no contest as Alain had recovered his flame.

And then we all had beers and snacks and to the mighty Royal de Chelles Chinese buffet for a mighty dinner.

Big thanks to the guys at Cosa Nostra park. The way everyone were treated was awesome.

And on a way back it was all gas station sessions.

Next year. Definitely back.

Winners’ circle. All night long.

Some footage and photos might appear here well before 2018 Olympics (that must be winter Olympics then).

To Finland tomorrow morning. Yes, Sir!