Josh Stafford Wins Amateur Skateboarding Championship
By Colin Bane
Josh Stafford
In the pro vert skateboarding Finals in Dallas at the LG Action Sports World Championships, 16 year-old rookie Alex Perelson finished in 2nd place behind Pierre-Luc Gagnon. The future is now. Just last year, Perelson and his fellow rookie Adam Taylor were stealing the show as amateurs on the Action Sports World Tour: This year, they’re putting the pressure on an older generation of pro vert veterans who had been dominating the sport for over a decade… and there’s plenty more where they came from.
Sixteen year-old skater Josh Stafford won the 2007 Amateur Skateboarding Championships at the LG event on Sunday in Dallas, with young riders Dylan Taylor (13) and Mitchie Brusco (10) close behind. Other competitors included Zach Miller, the 18 year-old son of skateboarding legend Chris Miller, and Lea Taylor, the 11 year-old sister of Adam Taylor and Dylan Taylor who says she plans to keep competing against the boys – as a pro – when she gets older.
“The competition was so fun and so intense,” says Stafford. “I bailed a kickflip Indy in my first run and then everybody’s runs after that were insane so I knew I had to put together a perfect run. Everybody skated so amazing. Everybody was doing tricks in their runs they’d never even done before, like Dylan’s melon 540. It was just crazy.”
Skaters like this don’t just come out of nowhere: With amateur events at every stop on the Action Sports World Tour, LG and the Action Sports Association are nurturing the future of vert skateboarding.
“LG for sure is one of the major players keeping vert skateboarding alive,” says Stafford. “I know I have a lot more work to do before I can hold my own with the pros, so we’ll just have to see what comes next. I’ll for sure be skating at Tampa Am in January and then going to all of the LG events next year. I look up to all of the pros so much and have been really lucky have so many of them helping me out, guys like last year’s champ Tas Pappas, and this year’s winner Pierre-Luc Gagnon. It’s really great to be a part of this whole community of vert skateboarders who want to see a future for the sport and keep looking out for the young guns.”