Richard Taylor : Memorial Comp
by Laura Huntley / Rollmodel

As most rollers will know unity recently ceased publishing, I wrote an article for them on the Richard Taylor memorial jam which took place on the 9th Sept 2006.

Most skaters have heard of Richard Taylor and for those who don’t here’s the lowdown :

Rich Taylor was one of the most charismatic, energetic and talented people in the industry. He was very popular amongst all, an amazing skater and an inspiration for positivity. At the young age of 23, Rich sadly passed away in August 2004. Since then memorial comps have been held for him in order to raise money for a skate park in his memory.

Alongside the comps money is raised via red memorial RT bands sporting his favorite quote ‘’its all good’’. Skaters are united at events such as NASS as you can easily spot a fellow roller sporting one, united in Rich’s memory.

up : Richard Taylor RIP

Gaynor Taylor still going strong alongside son Rob and the aid of Anthony Canning arranged the third comp in his memory ‘’The Da Richie Code.’’ Continuing the themed comps he used to run at the park.

It was a long journey for me this year after vacating the welsh side to up north, so everyone had to put up with my hyper ness all the way as the RT comp never fails to be a blast.

By putting the comp date forward to September as opposed to November proved a good call, as I think after last year many of us suffered frostbite!

It was a gorgeous day, and spirits were high. There was a great atmosphere and a high turnout – lots of regular faces and many new too. I heard a quote recently off a good friend of mine ‘’In rollerblading there are no strangers, only friends you haven’t met’’. This definitely applied to the jam everyone sporting smiles and being friendly despite many not knowing each other.

It was great to see so many people united in memory of Rich, traveling from far and wide to play there part in the fundraising.
The warm-ups were pretty quiet as many didn’t appear till later, but some sweet tricks were going down. Some note able ones were Danny Ives with a sexy disaster savannah on the rail, local Nate Webb with a fish to tru top porn on the rail, Escott with stylish 450 royales and Pete Short from Horsham with a disaster 450 back sav on the up across and down box.
The park started to fill up and I sat up on the back quarter with judges Chaz Sands, Jenna Downing and Jake Eley to watch the games begin. At about 1pm, it all kicked off with the under 13’s.

After 3 progressive heats the final 8 battled it out on the course. Ryan France stepping it up with perfect flips, 360 souls on the quarter, disaster topsouls and 360 soul attempts proving to be one of the best under 13s to date and clinching 1st. Andy Gilbert (Lil’ A) testing out his newly learnt back flips, perfect 720s over the box and a stylish royal 270 out on the rail took 2nd after quoting ‘’I don’t think I’m going to do very well’’ I think he was wrong!! James Barnes took 3rd.

After a little break the 16 and unders took place. It was a very competitive and hard comp to judge as there were so many pushing the limits. In the heats James Doll Smith with full cab tru top soyales on the rail and some stylish spins over the spine, and a massive 180 foam pit gap from Danny Whitley. Pete Bexley with disaster tornado topsoul attempts on the box and Zack Whitelaw with perfect 900’s over the jump box. The crowd were really starting to liven up during the heats and the final was very Intense. Martin Mansfield turning heads and taking 1st place dominating the rail with a disaster true fish and disaster savannah. Zack Whitelaw coming 2nd with tech variation spins to grinds on the rail. Mr Swindells took 3rd floating around the park with 180 backflips, spins and tech switch ups.

Tricks were getting a lot crazier ,during the brake before the open and Jake Eley (Loco)’’I really want to skate’’ escaped the judges panel briefly to have a skate at every chance! Frazer Watson doing this crazy wallride which involved tapping up it then onto the welsh flag on the wall and the on the way down to 180 out – was mental.

The 5 heats that followed left the crowd wide mouthed and showed a lot of talent. Phillip Sinetto with disaster kind on the rail. John Prescott with misty attempts over the rail – unfortunate enough to stack his hip after landing it before the heats. Welshy ‘Chelli’ after a year out still proved his worth with a disaster true top soyale on the rail.

After careful deliberation the finalists battled it out. A fresh face to me Peter ‘’I don’t think I’ll enter’’ Short after much persuasion from me entered and got 1st place. I’m hoping to see him at more events in the future, got roars from the crowd with a royale on the wallride, mint fastslides on the rail, cork 720s, disaster tru porn and disaster 540 true mizous. A well deserved first stylish, Consistent and threw some hammers. Welshy Andrew Bonter taking 2nd with some sick spins and technicality and a smooth backside on the rail. Fellow Welshy ‘sea monkey’ Steve Jones taking 3rd with a stylish 540 over the box and steezed tru top souls on the rail.

For a change watching the girls comp was odd due to recovering from an ankle injury, but looking at it from a different view showed me that girls in the sport are progressing to a much higher level. Becci Wallace fresh out of Woodward never fails to amaze me – she killed the rail with all sorts and most noticeably a disaster tru mizou which was perfect. I loved her quote immediately after prizegiving ‘’I’m poor buy these xsjados so I can go back to America!’’ haha what a winner.

Elite was awash with talent this year, kicking off straight in to a final due to lack of entrees it was a full blown battle to clinch the title. Unfortunately Mr Pruett couldn’t enter this year to a fall (non skating surprisingly), but it would have been interesting to see him enter as living up at Rampworx recently has defiantly made him even better.

Everyone watched the elites battling it out with a passion, some intense skating and deathly tricks. Adam Brown after a few attempts lacing 450 wallrides to 180 in the big quarter, James Frost also fresh out of Woodward, getting creative with a back royale on the quarter to soul down the flatbank edge. Local Barry boy Jack Cheek after a lot of encouragement from the crowd also playing about on big quarter, with a hugggeee walltap followed by a misty to flat over the driveway. Si Coburn with a really consistent run of tricks involving 540 opposite way of the death box, top soul 720 and a slick 540 into the bowl out of the flat placing 3rd. The stars of the show were Cardiff lad Sean Escott and Danny Ives. Sean scoring high with the judges with 450 disaster royals on the rail, royale on the rail to huck to royale on the grindbox and after a few attempts lacing disaster cab 720 ally oop soul on the grindbox. Understandably the crowd went wild. .It took a while to comprehend what Sean did it was so sick and landed perfectly. The best trick was awarded to him in memory of the late Josh Jones. Clinching best trick as well as 2nd place. Danny Ives killed it with with full cab true ally oop fish and disaster tru back savannah on the rail, followed by a disaster cab 720 true mizou on the up across and down box. A well deserved 1st place, expect big things from him in the future.

After a tiring day things started to die down and a chilled skate commenced Ty Brisset ripping up the mini and Chaz managing to stretch his legs for a play on the rail. Si Cox appearing and ripping around as well as Oli Short killing the quarter near the entrance and nearly killing me!

Then it was onto the new addition to the comp the newly online Kingdom Mag’s Joe Coyne organizing a last man standing comp in the bowl. I wasn’t sure at first how this would work put it basically involved throwing a load of skaters in the bowl at mach 10 speeds until the last person was left standing ‘’head butting not allowed’’ was stated but the big boys decided to play it rough which was great entertainment! It was ran clockwise and anti clockwise. Frazer, Julian Coulter, Cox, Taylor and Steve Riddick battled it out providing some giggles with some gnarly slams. Ryan France taking over the youngsters won a bunch of prizes. Steve Riddick won out of the big boys.

Then prizes were thrown in the bowl and the youngsters proved there worth by snapping those up pretty quickly whilst people rode around the bowl. No comp would be complete without a product toss which also took place in the bowl with prizes such as tees, dvds, posters, mags kindly donated by Ukskate.com, Powerslide, Fear & Rolling, Loco & Proline.

It was a long, but entertaining and successful day and hopefully The RT fund is closer to its minimum target of £45,000 so Gaynor & Rob and all involved are working hard to achieve this by Christmas. If you would like donate please visit www.richardtaylorfund.com where you can buy memorial wristbands (no excuses you should have one) and tees. Thanks to all who made it for the jam without you guys this wouldn’t happen and it will be great to see you all when the memorial park opens up in Rich’s hometown Barry.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t make the after party in Barry due to having youngsters with me, but I’m sure it was a blast. My evening involved a fire at the beach in Bridgend followed by a drunkathon slash I ended up tied up in cellotape!

Sean Escott made the after party and commented :

‘’The after party was held at the Savoy rock club in Barry, the venue was pretty packed however much to my disappointment not that many rollerbladers were present : Mark Trebble, Chris Hallem, Oli Short, Joe Coyne, Jake Ely, Alex Pym, Chaz Sands, Rob Taylor and that cool guy Sean Escott are just some of the people that were present haha. There was music from some local bands playing all sorts of Indie covers which fuelled the drunken crowd into a nice little party mood. I vaguely remember Steven Riddick getting into a fight with some big dude, which caused a little bit of a riot to start.

The party at the Savoy went on until around midnight or so, then all the roller bladers went on to have a beach fire down Barry sea front. It was at this point I realized Oli Short is not only great at building ramps out of nothing, but he is also good at making fires out of nothing. After terrorising the camp fire of some fishermen (who I apologise to haha.) Oli set a piece of cardboard on fire, then ran from their fire site all the way to the other side of the beach to ours, so that we could get our fire started. After a few hours at the beach the party people slowly started to say their goodbye’s. A good night all in all.’’

Rich is gone, but truly not forgotten and sorely missed. Till next year amigos for another great comp!!

By Laura Huntley/Rollmodel
www.myspace.com/laura2006

Related News :

• Richard Taylor : Tribute Edit
• Richard Taylor FUND

up : Richard Taylor RIP

Tags: richard taylor

This entry was posted on Sunday, December 24th, 2006 at 2:00 pm and is filed under Contests. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.