Street League recap –
Wow, the 9 Club got a lot more crowded in KC.
At the Nike SB World Tour’s first stop of the year in Kansas City, everything came together perfectly: the crowd was hyped; the world’s most elite skaters stepped up; the course was bananas; the webcast was the best of any live event; and the new SLS On Demand feature dropped, offering instant replays of every trick, every run, everything. In fact, with the advent of the incredible SLS On Demand feature, we can keep this recap almost as brief as Ishod Wair’s shorts. Well, not that short.
All kidding aside, if you love skateboarding, you gotta love the way the KC event unfolded. With an all-time display of 9 Club tricks, this was a banger of a contest.
That is, unless you’re Sean Malto. He was on his game all the way to the Final 8, and even threw on a fresh new jersey with his name across the back—repping the KC Chiefs in red and yellow. The crowd was ready to give their all for the hometown hero. And that’s when the wheels fell off—literally. Rolling to his first trick of his first run of the Finals, it looked like his kingpin broke. In fact, a loose kingpin nut came off his truck, sending his axle rolling the other way—simply a careless mistake setting up your board, and it can’t be blamed on anyone but himself. (Who else adjusts the tightness of your trucks?) In any case, Malto’s first run was clipped off before it got going. And when everyone else in the Finals nailed their first run, Malto was left behind the eight-ball. Malto’s show for the home crowd and shot at $100,000 bucks, all lost to one loose kingpin nut. That’s a tough, um, pill to swallow.
