After the contest, we headed over the road to a spot right by the art gallery that was putting on the “urb festival”. The spot had two sides, side nearest road was taken up with flatlanders, the other side behind a large statue was a skateboard spot, with ledges and stuff there, almost like it was made for them. This spot had a great vibe, people sat on the wall drinking beers and watching flatland. I had a good session with Dane Beardlsey for a few hours, Dane was working a super nice combo, backwards two dump truck pivot to upside down wheelie shove-it turbine to ice cream to backwards backyard xft pivot wheelie out!

Dane Beardsley.

Whilst Moto, Ikeda and Toon rested after the contest, hanging with Martti and the stoked Helsinki locals. After a few hours everyone kinda joined in, Bert Ribul from Estonia rips, we featured a lil edit a few months back, and I wondered “whos that?”, Bert is a real talent! Quick bars manual to whopper to pedals for example! Look for an interview soon…Aleksi Ritsila got involved in the session and dropped his nice carved peg wheelie to downside decade with ease…

Bert Ribul.

Moto and Ikeda soon got in the mood to ride again, and the session for them turned into “new tricks session”, Moto for example dropped a sick backwards spinning two footed pedal steam on the left side (opposite?) walkover to crackpacker right hand side!!! Whilst Ikeda stubble ducked into almost all his combos, whether in caboose position or gerator position, so awesome to see these guys away from the contest element, letting it fly! So where was Martti I hear you say? Well… Martti was being a host and chatting to everyone, getting food for the riders, beers, generally being an awesome host!

Moto Sasaki, nose wheelie direct to this…

The vibe was great! Everyone relaxed, chatting with few beers and riding in between! The weather was in the 80’s the whole time I was in Finland, for the japanese and Toon from Thailand it was a welcome rest bite from the humid tempertures they endure on a daily basis. So they were psyched. Everyone started working on new stuff, inspired by the great day they had all just experienced! It didnt get dark till at least 1130, which was pretty wild! Actually in some parts of finland, i believe in July it only gets dark for half an hour. I can’t imagine that!

As if Martti wasn’t already enough of a great host, he presented Moto with a huge bottle of champagne for winning groundtactics! Moto was stoked, but didn’t look like he’d be drinking it quite yet! After this lil presentation, the beers really started flowing, it was a great end to a great day! Day three coming tommorow…

Saturday was the day of the groundtactics final! Martti had to teach kids flatland during the morning, he was stoked kids were really responding to flatland, I chilled at Martti’s flat with the guys. So we rode down to the venue around midday, with Toon as our guide, we got lost! So a quick call to Martti and he came to pick us up and ride down to the venue. The contest was scheduled for 5pm, we arrived at the venue, in downtown Helsinki at 1pm.

Martti took us all to lunch, he went out of his way all weekend to make sure the guys were comfortable and ready to compete. The rice was flowing, as Martti explained what myself and he were looking for in terms of judging criteria, and the five run format! Groundtactics is not a regular contest, this is about pushing the level of flatland higher, and the format gave the riders the chance to do that! I personally thought this was a very personal touch that only someone like Martti can bring, cause he understands the concerns and questions of a top rider.

The locals were naturally stoked to see big names like Moto Sasaki, Takahiro Ikeda and Toon in their native homeland. The whole vibe was really relaxed. The groundtactics event was part of a creative arts festival called “URB”. Just around the corner from the event was a sweet lil coffee bar with flatland photographs being exhibited. Lot of spectators came to check out the unique groundtactics contest, and more importantly stayed and interacted with the riders before, during and after the event.

The guys had a real good vibe towards each other all weekend, it was kinda funny before the runs as they prepared, this was the one time they separated all weekend! The five run format had plenty of twists, if it had been a one run format, Takahiro Ikeda would have won! Both Takahiro and Toon’s first runs were their best, Moto’s 3rd run was his best of the day, during some runs when he touched, he’d go for some insane combos, which is what we wanted, backwards spinning karl bar flip to circle k to halfpacker stuck out in my mind, as like wow, he’s going for it! Ikeda pushed his level, trying the time machine walkover to spinning gerator without laying the bike down, plus a few new moves in there, both he and Moto had a ton of new stuff. Moto dropped a wicked nose manual direct to backwards spinning karl to xft steam flip to halfpacker in practise, sadly this combo didn’t appear in the contest, nevertheless, the audience knew what was up and grasped as he threw his body into the backwards spin. It was a beautiful moment. Toon was stomping everything in practise, I thought he might cause an upset, but sadly crumbled under the pressure. His grunts mid trick were the topic of many riders throughout the weekend, Toon was a ton of fun to hang out with. He’ll be back! The mc, Michael Black electro brought a nice light hearted hip hop style to a serious contest! The riders, and the audience were stoked, from the contest we went for a session at a nearby riding spot! Much respect to Nokia for supporting the groundtactics event! What a success for the first year! One of the best events ive ever been to!