Amateur hour

Skateboarding talent ride into
Montreal for AM Getting Paid

PAID WINNER: Antoine Asselin

by PATRICK LEJTENYI

Breaking into the pros in any sport is tough, and skateboarding is no exception. But what is galling to the amateur skateboarder, says Alex Bastide, is a lack of compensation for amateurs even when they show up the pros at competitions. That’s why the 32-year-old owner of Underworld Skateshop has been organizing the AM Getting Paid event for the past four years, with the latest edition going down this weekend at Southparc skate park on the South Shore (8100 Taschereau).

The idea behind AM Getting Paid is simple. Bring the best amateurs skateboarding today to Montreal, set up a simple competition and go wild. There’s no age restriction, but Bastide says the event is becoming an increasingly important one in the industry.

“Montreal is the best city to host a contest like this,” he says. Amateurs tend to be young, so the city’s nightlife, easy-going lifestyle, lax drinking age and female companionship is a natural draw for a kid from, say, wherever isn’t Montreal. “They’re going to have the time of their lives,” he says.

The vicious circle that hinders the amateurs—the “AM” in “AM Getting Paid”—is the industry’s fixation on handing out cash to athletes who are already professional, says Bastide. While talented amateurs do have sponsors, they (or their parents) generally have to shell out big bucks to compete. Bastide says he wants to buck that trend, and is flying out and paying the hotel bills for some of the kids appearing at this event. “We’re kind of preparing them for becoming pros,” he says.

Being a pro, of course, isn’t all travel and hotels and getting wasted with the supple and the willing. It’s largely about having the time and opportunity to practise, practise some more, and then practise even more. And that can cut into paying-the-bills time. “These guys are the future pros, they need money right now,” says Bastide.

There is some money to be made at AM Getting Paid—not a whole lot, but enough to make the trip worthwhile. Thanks to sponsors like skate gear makers Zoo York, Monster Energy drinks, Coors Light, Fallen Footwear, SBC skateboard magazine and several others—including Underworld—the contest will be distributing a total of $10,000 in prizes, including cash money handed out to participants in a post-finals trick contest, where Bastide will be walking around with a fist full of cash and doling out between $20 and $60 to kids who impress him.

With somewhere between 130 and 140 participants, including around 30 from Quebec, Bastide says AM Getting Paid is a great opportunity to spot new up-and-coming talent. Past winners have included Montreal’s 18-year-old Antoine Asselin, Vancouver’s Ryan Decenzo and 11-year-old wunderkind Nyjah Huston of California. Bastide expects some 200 talent scouts and team managers to fly in from skateboarding hotspots around the continent to check out the cream of the crop.

And he expects the cream to rise. Bastide says the only comparable amateur contest is the Tampa AM, and that shows in the quality of participants who show up. “We want the best skating possible,” he says. “Sometimes, amateur skaters are even better than the pros, because they’re hungry. They know this is the contest to win.”

AM Getting Paid takes place from Friday,
July 18 to Sunday, July 20. For more info,
visit www. amgettingpaid.com