Worlds Critique

Senor Grommet · Post by **Senor Grommet** » 01 Aug 2004 23:55

Since I was not there, I cannot give one, however this thread is for any shredder who has been to at least 1 worlds event before the one recently concluded to critique this years worlds as compared to year(s) past. How well was it run? Where was the shred? Was there great publicity? How was the environment? Weather? Were crowds attracted? What were the venues like? How was tourney organization? What events were held?

BTW, was rippin run held?

Thanks for the info. Everyone appreciates honesty

max · Post by **max** » 02 Aug 2004 04:05

I was in Prague last year, so I'll post a few comments.

Low points of this year's Worlds:
- first day of freestyle comp it was held in a theatre where the light was ridiculously dim. So all intermediate first round routines/shred were done there, then women shred then open shred. Honestly the light was BAD I don't think I was the only one to point that out. From what I heard from Yacine the lights technician quit his job 1 week before the tourny and hence the organisers were left up a certain creek without a padle.
Then they got the lights on the stage to work and all further events were done there so that was cool.

- Clashes with the owners of the theatre where the freestyle events were held. When the theatre was open to footbaggers all night to shred/party, the beer was being sold by the OWNERS of the the theatre (not the organisers of Worlds) and that beer was very expensive compared to other bars I'd seen in Montreal. Since it was expensive not many people bought some and so the owners got pissed and RAISED the prices... go figure. That's also what happenned on saturday, so lots of shredders went out to surrounding bars then came back... kinda defeats the whole "community" point I think. Oh, on finals night the OWNERS decided that no water was allowed to be brought into the theatre.. so bag searches for everyone, confiscation of bottles of water.. WTF was up with that? The owners provided water by the glass though but still..

- sick 3 pulled randomly out of a hat at 2am. I missed that one. I know it's a silly event, a non-event really just a show, but I know that lots of people (me included) were REALLY looking forward to it.

- This has nothing to do with organistaion but: girl attendance was so low it baffled me. I was told that's how it usually is at US comps.. you shredders have to come to Euros!

- some kind of seeding problem arrised in open pools (see pool 6, the pool of death).

What I really did like about this comp:
- finals night was fantastic. Yacine did a fantastic job MCing the whole event. His demo with Sebastian was a very good show esp. to non-footbaggers. Oh, and Yacine also had to compete so cheers to him!
- the venue was great, big theatre with balconies, stage, the lot.
- THE PLACE WAS PACKED. Good communication effort for sure.
- Tam tam jam is something to see. Great memories.

*Jethro* · Post by ***Jethro*** » 02 Aug 2004 15:51

Which night had the most people, and what was the estimated attendence for that night?

shaggster · Post by **shaggster** » 02 Aug 2004 15:57

although i was not there all week i will have to agree with max on the point that the lighting was really low... you could hardly see the bag. umm jethro finals night probably had the most people i would say maybe 150-250 people maybe.

max · Post by **max** » 02 Aug 2004 16:14

Finals night was saturday, and there was a lot more than 250 people for sure. The top floor was also packed up pretty tight. I'm fairly confident that there were 500+ people there.

shreddaily · Post by **shreddaily** » 02 Aug 2004 18:48

Alright, Ken, you said you had a few things to post here so......
post them

hacksterbator · Post by **hacksterbator** » 02 Aug 2004 19:26

just a note about sick 3. it was not organized by the worlds team. some people at a near by bar were bitching about the lack of sick 3 at about midnight and andrew from toronto took it into his own hands. he walked around asking tons of people if they wanted to compete in the unofficial sick 3. he managed to get his hands on the mic at about 2 am and just basically said "we're having a unofficial sick 3 right now. who's in?" and then it went.

Splint · Post by **Splint** » 02 Aug 2004 20:29

Monday:
Shred day 1:
The Place de Artes was the most awesome place to shred. They were setting up for a music festival and it was a touristy place so it was HUGE publicity for freestyle and just an awesome venue to hang out and watch awesome shred. Ellis was all over, talking to people and promoting and selling tickets to Finals night. The place was perfect.

So there I am being completely and awesomely overwhelmed by the coolness of seeing some 20 or so circles of kick ass shred and I just don't know what to do first. Then I see Pete, Chad, Eric Windsor and Honza and I figure that's a great circle to start out watching. Almost immediately Eric and Chad drop out of the circle and Caleb and Ellis jump in. About 30 seconds later Vasek comes on over and jumps into the circle. I'm thinkin', "HOW FUCKIN COOL IS THIS CIRCLE". Within 2 minutes about 80 to 100 people flocked to watch this circle.

I can honestly only comment on 3 of things that I saw. My blood was pumping so fast through my veins that I experienced almost total memory loss. What I remember are Vasek Combos?

Frantic Buttterfly > Bedwetter (SICK rewind)
Ripstein > Whirr > Ripstein > Double Blender
Superdooperfly > Symposium Flurry (by far my favorite combo of the week)

I was feeling so good after watching that circle for a while that I felt I could kick. I felt weak for about the first hour and then started remembering how to play. After about two hours I was kicking fairly well and starting to hit some good stuff and pop... I reinjured my neck...(on day fucking ONE of Worlds....SSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHIIIIIIIIIIIITTTTTTTTT!!!!!!!!!)

I'll write about Tuesday tomorrow (Tuesday

)

Dat · Post by **Dat** » 03 Aug 2004 09:21

aww man Brad K was there? I didn't get to meet you.

Last worlds I attended was 2002 in San Francisco.

Place Des Arts was indeed a cool place for shred. Good place to promote footbag. I saw Ellis walking around handing out fliers for worlds. Tam Tam Jam was also very fun.

The Rialto was disappointing to say the least. Poor lighting has been touched already. It definitely affected the performance of players. Inadequate seating was a problem too. I did not enjoy paying 10 dollars to sit on the floor during finals. I really missed the ample posh seating at San Francisco's worlds. On finals night one of the bartenders actually refused to give me a glass of water. I had to ask a different bartender. Oh yeah there was this old dude walking around on day 3 or 4 in the Rialto collectiong people's bottles, even when they had water still left in them. I saw him behind the bar emptying them out at some point so I'm thinking he is associated with the place. Playing with people smoking indoors was not pleasant either.

I remember in San Francisco there being a nice shred spot the whole week. Indoors, well lit, only problem was that we had to keep the noise down. This year players had to play outside in sparse lighting or on seperate floors of the host dorm.

The lowlight of worlds was probably the awards ceremony. It was planned at a bar where many younger players were not allowed, including those who were receiving awards. After this problem became apparent the the ceremony was held in a park nearby. I find it very depressing our sport celebrated its best players in a park at midnight. Yves Archambault apologized by saying they did not foresee this happening because the older net players don't have a problem getting into bars, as if it was the freestylers fault for being mostly young.

Splint · Post by **Splint** » 04 Aug 2004 20:10

Well I decided I'm not going to do the "day to day" thing. I'm in the midst of moving now and I just don't have the time to do all that.

Since this is a Worlds Critique topic I'll say a few critical things.

I was disappointed in the Rialto as well, though by Saturday the lighting seemed to be better especially if you played anywhere near the stage. Beer on Saturday night was 8 bucks. I don't care if it was Canadian or not...it was still 8 bucks.

I was extremely impressed with how smoothly the tournament ran. Yacine did and excellent job MCing and moving things along on Saturday night for the finals and really made sure the crowd was "in the know" about freestyle. He and Sebastien did an excellent series of demonstrations and explanations.
My only beef about that part was that it was all in French. I know we were in Montreal, but my experience was that most of the international players spoke english and like 99% of Montrealers spoke English while like 4 of the players spoke french. So it seemed to me that English would have been the better choice for finals night. It would have been great if they could have had two people doing English and French like they did at the Net Finals.

WOMEN...WHERE WERE THE WOMEN. I was SSSSSSSOOOOOOOOO looking forward to seeing major female shred. There were like 6. I was so stoked that my wife might see some awesome shreditas and get pumped to put her lavers back on. What the hell happened to the North American Women.

My biggest issue though was Nate Linscott getting screwed. I mean royally fucking screwed. he had the least amount of drops (1) in Pool 6 and his routine was extremely well choreographed. I was standing next to a certain 5 time World champ who turned to me after his routine finished and said "somebody just got upset right there". Instead of placing easily in the top 5 to continue into semi's he was placed 8th out of 9 players. BULLSHIT!!! That decision should have been overturned without question. It severely soured the competition for me and I chose not to go to watch the Semi's.

All in all though I had a great time at worlds and I thought it was better than my other worlds experience in '99.

Oh and I got to see Pete hit Ripped Warrior Swirl (Cyborg) on the last day.

Posi-Cole · Post by **Posi-Cole** » 05 Aug 2004 04:18

Splint wrote: My only beef about that part was that it was all in French. I know we were in Montreal, but my experience was that most of the international players spoke english and like 99% of Montrealers spoke English while like 4 of the players spoke french.

I do believe the demos were intended for those who were not footbag players who were in attendance, in an attempt to spread knowledge about footbag. Therefore, yes, most of the players do speak English, but the demo was for the common folk/public, who more than likely spoke French.

Splint · Post by **Splint** » 05 Aug 2004 10:24

Except that the whole thing was in french, not just the demos.

Posi-Cole · Post by **Posi-Cole** » 05 Aug 2004 11:41

Splint wrote:Except that the whole thing was in french, not just the demos.

Yes .. well, everything else can just be understood by English footbag players and therefore it does seem more valuable for the MC to explain everything in French so that the non footbaggers can follow along.

Aside from the demos, everything else was just like intros, descriptions of the events, and announcing the scores - all of which would be needed to be in the same language to keep up consistency and make the show more appealing for non footbaggers who speak French.

Believe me, I was originally upset too when I learned the show would be in French, but then I just thought of what the reason would be, and it did seem logical, and probably for the better interests of footbags growth.

Although I do wonder exactly how many non footbag people there were there - Hopefully enough to justify the French show.

Laroche · Post by **Laroche** » 05 Aug 2004 12:18

There were TONS of non-footbaggers at the show, and alot of them do not speak very good english. I sold alot of tickets myself, and most people do not speak english.

Outsider · Post by **Outsider** » 05 Aug 2004 14:37

Personally, I kind of enjoyed the French show. Since it was freestyle footbag they were talking about, I found it kind of fun to attempt to understand it even though it was in a language I barely comprehend.

I found it disappointing only in that this is the second time I have had the opportunity to to witness Yax and Hurricane's freestyle demo (Seb made it through nearly dropless last year), and I think its a terrific idea if you happen to have such a significant crowd of spectators. The disappointing part is that I can't copy their demo word for word because I still don't know exactly what they said. I guess I'll have to invent my own demo, should the opportunity arrise. I liked the addition of the bright ball on that angled rod, though (if you weren't there, Yax had an orange ball on the end of a black plastic rod: he'd hold the ball on Seb's foot and move it to simulate the footbag in the air as Sebastien demonstrated various dexterities in slow-motion). That was a good idea.

max · Post by **max** » 05 Aug 2004 17:27

Jonathan: if there's a video of the demos, as I hope there will be one, I'll gladly translate all of it to the best of my ability.

mouseman · Post by **mouseman** » 06 Aug 2004 09:17

The place, Rialto, sucked. First day, no lights. Final day, too bright lights (I dropped once just because the lights, and I wasn't the only one). The no water policy was killing me. I were told that europeans could have stomach illness from the crane water, you couldn't have your own water and the water cost 7$ per litre in the place. A very nice combination in time where I was swetting like a litre in 10minutes, because it was hot and the spotlights were in the stage that I played. The last day hall of fame/BAP announcement/victory ceremony/bar hazard did take away the whole credibility of the event. This was supposed to be World Championships, not some park meeting with old friends who have invented some sport to have an excuse to smoke pot and have fun together. It makes me angry to see some players who really have put alot money and time to it standing disappointed when their dreams of real sport (what they take footbag) came crashing down.

There were alot of things (no music in shreds, show in french (I guess it's okay to us keep the show in finnish next year, because it's just the language we speak here..), bad communications & information to players, no back stage to warm up - just to name some) and I was generally stunned how bad it was compared to so fantastic euros.

I'm seriously thinking not to waste any more money travelling to Northern America. The good old NA players seemed to have a really, really lazy year. To me it seems that Europe is taking over the footbag freestyle scene in quality and quantity, also having better organized tournaments.

The main reason, however, is the general attitude. Europeans just take the sport more seriously, practice more and believe that it can grow. And it grows rapidly. Because of that, it isn't absurd to get real sponsors to sponsor our tournaments. Because we are what we say, competitors in real sport, we can have succesfull events with 'large' budget like Euros 2004.

Really, if I would have a company, I would never sponsor the gang we did see in the park the last day. Never.

If we want to change footbag, we need to change ourselves.

This is more critique against players' attitudes in general, not towards worlds 2004 organizers. I know it isn't easy and I know they did their best. Worlds had alot cool succesfull ideas, got great crowd in the finals day (400+ sold tickets in the final day, I believe Yacine said) and many more things. I just think the scene is slowing the excellent sport down.

Don't take it personal.

shreddaily · Post by **shreddaily** » 06 Aug 2004 10:30

Generalizing North Americans as lazy, unorganized people who aren't dedicated to the sport, how could we take that personaly??

bigdirtyfoot · Post by **bigdirtyfoot** » 06 Aug 2004 10:47

Yeah I agree with Nate. But then again I actually AM lazy.

I think the reason it's booming in Europe is because the level of shredders over there is higher, and the public is MORE ACCEPTING and not going around saying "Oh that's hacky sack, my uncle's sister's friend does that and he's better than you" like some North Americans. But that's just my guess, because I've not yet been to Europe.

the Executioner · Post by **the Executioner** » 06 Aug 2004 11:04

mouseman wrote: I'm seriously thinking not to waste any more money travelling to Northern America. The good old NA players seemed to have a really, really lazy year. To me it seems that Europe is taking over the footbag freestyle scene in quality and quantity, also having better organized tournaments.

This is more critique against players' attitudes in general, not towards worlds 2004 organizers. I know it isn't easy and I know they did their best. Worlds had alot cool succesfull ideas, got great crowd in the finals day (400+ sold tickets in the final day, I believe Yacine said) and many more things. I just think the scene is slowing the excellent sport down.

Don't take it personal.

Jere,
Your entire post centered around critiques due to organizational problems by the staff of worlds--and then at the end of your post you turn around and say that you are giving a critique of north american players, not the event organizers--that they did their best, ect. Could you please be more specific of your critiques of north american players? I would be interested to hear. I am also interested to hear what you mean by "the old NA players seemed to have a really, really lazy year."
I am not taking it personally, I am geniuinely interested to hear what you have to say.