8 years ago, probably to the day I was attending the opening day at Revolution Skatepark.  Kitted out, with full body armour and a helmet, alongside my homemade ripped senate ultra wides jeans, I was to find my new home. From the ages of 12 to 15 I would make the trip to Revolution with my dad to skate all weekend, from 10am till late until I couldn't skate anymore.  As I grew up, I began to find new faces to skate with and venture out to new places.  With this in mind, kids continued to use Revolutions facilities and a new generation of skaters were born.  Having only visited Revolution every so often on a wet Sunday afternoon I would keep in touch with the staff and development, and to a great surprise found myself now standing in a Revolution Extreme centre. Rock Climbing wall, music events, premieres, skate jams for all BMX'ers, Inline and Boarders and more.

Myself and Steve Mann were approached to help with some input towards an up and coming event.  So we shared some ideas, and we began to let everybody know to be at Revolution on the 23rd.  Bearing in mind the park is owned by skate boarders, and with the Inline scene at the park not being as strong as others, we were all a little hesitant, but excited none the less. Talks had been made to build new obstacles in the park, which we all thought would contribute towards making this day stand out to other jams in the past.

Sunday 23rd July:

I arrived at the park a little before it opened to help out the guys at Revs setting things up. I took a little walk around the park to see what I could find, so not expecting a picnic bench, new wallride, filing cabinet and a fridge freezer to skate.  As if!  As the final touches were being made outside with the marquee, a few familiar faces began to appear and the smell of the barbeque warming up outside got you thinking today was going to be a session!  It was awesome to have the outside area which holds a mini-ramp and a beginners section with quarters, square boxes and floor poles.  As midday came, so did the 30 degree temperatures, the event was finally beginning to come together.  The Contrast guys, Dan Bond, Dan Tillett, Rob Nunn, Farzad Takaloo and Andrew Halls were among many with the likes of the Hastings guys, Alex, Rory and Loco Skates Flow rider Billy Doyle.

The first to start off the day was the Launch box high jump competition.  The guys at Revs had made a high jump stand, with different heights ranging from 1ft to 9ft. A queue formed at the top of the flat bank, and it was good to see everybody having a go.  Go on Easton!!  Everybody sessioned, and there was an amazing vibe coming from everybody.  It was really cool to see the younger kids giving it ago, most of them had only been skating for a few months.  As the jam went on, the height on the bar increased and people started to fall out leaving others to battle on.  Little Pete and Zach, around 13-14 years old, were both just feet away from hitting the lights on the roof.  Still the bar was moved up, towards 6ft.  I couldn't resist, I had to have a go myself and managed to Backflip the bar.  The Jam went on; Jeremy Colegate eventually took the win, and went off the scale, literally!  He was jumping higher than the bar supports themselves!

Next up was the Under 15's Jam.  About 12 skaters in this category but again, the vibe was amazing.  Everyone was determined and giving 110%. The guys that had just started rolling were beginning to blend in with those who had been doing it for years. The older guys were encouraging them to try new things, and you could tell they were having so much fun. Keiron M won a Contrast DVD for being the only skater to grind the rail in his age group. Will B who took third, managed to land a sick 540 on the launch box, followed by a Makio stall on the filing cabinet from the quarter.  Will's placement was for not giving up despite some bails, and achieving his goals.  Pete and Zach continued to fly around the park, with huge airs and massive wall stalls out of the quarters, fighting for 1st place. It's always cool watching the younger skaters cruising around the park, trying to hunt out the next big talent.  It was difficult but Steve Mann and I eventually went with Pete, who won the under 15s.

It was now time to step up the pace a little, and straight onto the course for the 16+ was Mark Neilson setting the standard for what would follow in the next 20 minutes.  Unit 1 local Mark absolutely destroyed most obstacles that stood in his way. Cess slides, wallrides, and the smoothest fastslide to fishbrain to fakie around the bowl. One thing I missed, but I'll go by what I was told, Mark had spun onto the wallride from the quarter, had cess slid and toe tapped around off the wallride whilst still spinning then back into the quarter.   Prizes were given at the end for skaters who had pushed their own limits, and gave it their best shot.  The only girl in the park Holly was cruising around using the launch box and driveway with ease, and also giving the rest of the park something to smile about!  Holly took home a Skate Warehouse T-shirt.  A Contrast DVD was given to Scott for not letting it beat him and finally landing a sick full tru mizou around the quarter bowl.  The Jam format at times can be hard to judge, so many skaters on the course at once makes it a chore to keep up.  However out of the corner of your eye, you would see Dan Bond consistently lining trick after trick finishing on the quarter to flat bank AO fish and AO topacid. Dan's creativity all day, landing tricks that the locals hadn't even thought of trying contributed to his third place.  Loco Skates flow rider / lippy deadman Billy Doyle impressed the crowd with his fluent style and disasters on the rail.  Wallriding his way around the park twice as fast as anybody else lead Billy to second place.  Billy seems to be one of those skaters that just clicks one day, and has everything on lock.  Full tru miz down the dirty square box and disaster savannah on the rail.  Craig Whitehead, the winner of the last Jam at Revolution was to take first again.  Craig demonstrated he could cab 450 everything around the Quarterbowl. Cab 450 topsoul to tts around the bowl - laced!  Craig won for his style and park use and generally just doing tricks that hadn't been done at Revolution before.  Revolutions own breed Dan Martin would steal the biggest trick.  Dan stormed the park at Mach 10 to transfer from the quarter bowl Wallriding over the new wallride about 8ft up, and back into the flat bank to the crowds delight.

Following tradition, at these Revolution Jams, we would top the day off with a skate on Ramsgate seafront at the infamous seafront ledge.  Andrew Halls was doing the nicest full tru pornstars off the ledge, with Farzad lining him switch fishbrain to fakie then zero spin alley opp fish Fullcab out.  Mark Neilson was going to the ledge fakie, to front torque to bs fastslide budget tru savannah which I had never seen anybody do before.  Yes Mark! The Seafront ledge is the perfect place to chill out after a days skating, watching the sunset, playing football, beers, maybe another BBQ, swimming in the sea and of course a bit of skating late into the evening before everybody set for home.   If you ever hear of a Jam coming up in this area and you live near by I would suggest you DO come.  Even if you don't skate, cant skate, injured, dog ate your skates, anything.  Just come for the atmosphere, the food and crack and you will have a splendid day.

Sim Warren