To celebrate the 10th anniversary of our partnership with Monster Energy and to remember what it was like to be able to attend live events, we decided to jump back in time to revisit some of the best events that we did with Monster over the past few years. For the first edition of our Blast From The Past blog section, let’s travel back to 2012 with one of the most legendary edition of the Vans Backyard Party!
Just like most of you, we can’t wait to be back in the field with our community during live events. As we’re slowly getting out of a global pandemic, there is still uncertainty in the air and we unfortunately have to wait for a more stable time to organize new events. As nostalgia totally took over, we thought that travelling back in time to revisit some of our most epic events would be a good way to make things easier while we wait for our next public gathering.
Keep reading to dive back into the action at the Backyard Party 2012 and stay tuned for more Blast From the Past Presented by Monster coming up on our blog.
BYP'S HISTORY
The Empire Backyard Party started back in 2007, when the infamous Montreal skateboarder Eric Mercier, with the help of Vans, had the brilliant idea to organize a ramp contest where the setup looks exactly like a “backyard bowl party”. And every year, a party it was! Music, skateboarders from all over the world, ramps with multiple funky features and a set that really makes you feel like you were chilling in someone’s backyard.
Year after year, the deck of the pool got more crowded and international pro skaters were travelling to Montreal for the occasion. Not long after, the Backyard Party truly became a world-famous event and an annual meeting for the best transition skaters in the world. Formerly taking place at South-Parc skatepark in Brossard, the 2012 edition was the first one to take place in a full-fledged arena setup.
Every single edition of the backyard party was epic, but the 2012 edition was by far the biggest and most impressive one. This one took place at the Arena Jean Béliveau and included a huge cash purse, a flawless ramp with insane features, epic parties, video premieres and high level skateboarding all weekend long. It’s simple, the event attracted some of the most legendary skateboarders in the world! If you were there, you know how next level it was!
It’s always great to see some of the best in the world compete with local talent and this event was showcasing it perfectly . Seeing our local guys like Hugo Balek or Chris Mongenais competing with the likes of Curren Caples, Kyle Berard or Tom Remillard was a great experience and a great way to witness the raw talent we have here in Quebec.
THE RAMP
We couldn’t talk about the 2012 edition of the Backyard Party without talking about the event’s insane ramp setup. The 2012 Backyard Party’s ramp was the biggest one the event has seen and definitely one for the books. “We took the Empire Mini-Ramp, a piece of the South Park bowl as well as another friend’s ramp, we put all 3 together and completed it with a vert wall and a massive hip with a huge ledge on top” said the event's creator Eric Mercier.
The Backyard Party's ramp was very diverse and allowed for a wide variety of transition skating styles to happen. Some were blasting airs in the steep section, some were dancing on the smaller section's copings while others were doing technical tricks on the hip and ledge. All in all, the design of the ramp sure made for some extremely entertaining skateboarding and all the contestants looked like they were having a good time. As viewers, we sure did!
THE BONES BRIGADE VIDEO PREMIERE
The Backyard Party’s weekend started off strong with The Bones video premiere. Friday before the contest, everybody gathered at the designated venue to watch the documentary alongside the legends that are actually featured in it. That’s right, we were watching the movie with Tony Hawk, Ray Barbee, Tommy Guerrero, Lance Mountain and more. Let’s just say that if Tony Hawk is at your event, it means it’s a great one. It was unreal.
A LOOK BACK ON THE ACTION
BYP's 2012 winners. Kyle Berard in first, Curren Caples in Second and Riley Boland in third.
Over the course of the weekend, our Winner Kyle Berard did not miss one backside flip on the hip.
Curren Caples was in town for the weekend and went home 3 grands richer.
Third place winner and Canadien ambassador Riley Boland was flying all over the course the whole weekend and left with a nice $2500.
Syle Master and transition legend in the making Tom Remillard was in the building. Back smith with ease.
The new member of the Empire Skate team Hugo Balek killed the BYP 2012 and got 6th place. He also left with some nice best trick money for this kickflip into the bank.
Scott Decenzo was there doing some of the techest coping tricks you can think of.
Even if he was still a teen, Ronnie Sandoval already had a lot of style back in 2012.
