PNWR 2010 Write Up.
Back from another great contest once again, and just like last year, PNWR remains one of my favorite yoyo contest to attend.
I traveled to Seattle with my uncle and we stayed at the “Seattle Center Travelodge” (Which isn’t exactly at the “seattle center” but close enough.)
One thing that was different from last year, is that there were no yoyoers outside throwing in the hotel entrance. This is odd cause at most contest for the main hotel everyone stays at, there are always a bunch of throwers outside. Not so for this time though, everyone must have been tired from the trip I guess.
I headed over to the center house to get some lunch and see if any fellow throwers were lurking around the area. Nobody around for quite some time, until around 5:30 when I saw someone throwing a protostar and looking around wondering where other yoyoers were.
Quickly we were joined by Justin Vongpanya (Kobansora on the forums), and then many other crowds of throwers including some guys from Canada, Travis from Alaska (Who has amazing tech 5A by the way), and the sponsored people.
Pre contest meet ups the night before a contest are always fun. You get to try new yoyos, and meet people you might have never spoken to before in person.
Awesome.
I hung out with Dylan Benharris and Reed Smith for a while. Dylan’s 4A and 1A is really getting good, he was telling me about tons of the new trick concepts he has been creating, as well as forgotten concepts he wants to bring back. His 4A is just crazy.
Reed showed me his 1A prelim he had planned and both me and Dylan agreed that although his tricks aren’t the most technical ever, his flow and style and just wonderful to watch.
Got to check out Grant Johnsons new signature 1A yoyo, and Bryan Figueroa’s new 4A yoyo the FIESTA!!! 
Both of them are amazing yoyos and I am sure that tons of people are gonna buy these up quickly.
Awesome moments: Dylan imitating Mickey, Yuuki, Ando, Mark Mont, Anthony Rojas, Jason Lee, Eric Koloski, and Jensen Kimmit with Jensen standing right next to us.
FIESTA! (hits head), Since when does Sterling do 2A!?!, KEEP YO SOUL!
And who wants cake? Aquas almost getting lost in the childrens museum multiple times, and Seattle has a curfew?
Friday night was indeed awesome.
Saturday.
Day of the contest, went to get breakfast and was joined by many Bon Jovi fans.
Bon Jovi had a concert at Key Arena near the contest so much of the hotel guest were super excited fans.
Again no yoyoers in the lobby, so I got my stuff together and headed over to the center house.
I said it last year, and I say it again this year. the center house is pretty much THE BEST contest venue ever. its indoors, really nice and open, tons of seating, over 10 different places to eat at with a huge selection, stuff for the parents of the yoyoers to do, and lots of people going through to check it out.
Just awesome.
I registered for all 5 divisions this year. 1A 2A 3A 4A 5A.
I used to do this at almost every contest I go to, but stopped for a while to focus on 1A and 5A. Thought I would try to do all 5 again just for fun.
I got my yoyojam meteor and went over to the contest practice area to practice.
I was quickly joined by Reed and I watched his prelim once again.
A news cameraman walked over and set up his gear and another guy came up to us and asked if we could just yoyo a bit for him. “Pretend I am not even here!” The guy said. A bit hard to do when you have over 10,000 dollars worth of camera gear shooting you at multiple angles, but it was cool. We then got interviewed for a bit and more yoyoing was filmed.
Some of you may remember that last year, I got offered sponsorship by a young kid named “Emerson” and the sponsorship perk was that I would get a penny at every contest I went too that he was there as well. Well he was not able to make it this year, but he sent another kid there to give me a penny! Wow!
So awesome.
The sport division started and I went to hang out with Justin (Kobansora), Clint (Shades7), Henvey (Shisaki), and Dylan.
We were talking a bit when Justin brought up something that got us all thinking.
“Hey, did you guys notice that last year, nobody cheered at all.”
This is so true, last year, almost nobody did. Well, it was our time to change that.
We all agreed to scream our loudest at this contest like a Japan regional contest.
And scream we did.
!
My 1A preliminary went quite well, I was quite happy with it and had lots of fun on stage.
I was quite impressed by a few 1A prelims, Tyler Kamigaki (Kumo) had a really nice prelim that flowed together nicely.
Ryan Jameff totally blew me away with his nice and smooth style, Leo Qin (Fzzyrn) has such a competition level style and some screaming fans, Adam Bottiglia brought back some old school style and literally had the most cheering from everyone in the audience that day, and Avi Meyer is a young kid with a really nice style, I would look out for him as I am sure that he will be one of the next young yoyo prodigy’s.
Ok mister JUSTIN “KOBANSORA” VONGPANYA. What’s with you hyping us on yyn saying how you were ready for 4A and 1A at pnwr and then not competing!
You owe us money, you owe ALL of us money!
The results were announced for the 1A prelims and who would go into the 1A finals.
I actually made it! And was the 3rd placing in the 1A prelims as well!
Wow!
I was a bit sad to see that Adam Bottiglia did not make the finals, but oh well, I guess responsive flashy looping tricks just don’t cut it anymore. But from talking to many people in the audience, they all thought for sure he would be in the finals (and many thought he could win the whole thing actually).
Leo got into the finals which came as no surprise to me, as well as everyones favorite cool guy who is cool: Jacob “Elephark” Jensen.
Got some pizza for lunch with Henvey and then decided to go film every person in the practice area saying “Hi” or “what’s up?”
That was awesome, and I hope I didn’t confuse any of you who were there too much. (Now that I think about it, I think some of the people I said hi to were not even yoyoers.) D:
Put the camera down for a bit and went over to the 4A group of people.
Bryan, Justin, Kyle Hedges, and Anthony Martinez. Justin convinced me to buy a Shinwoo Griffin Wing, and I don’t regret that purchase at all. Its AMAZING. My new main 4A throw for sure. Really smooth, and nice solid feel to it. Awesome.
2A finals started and I was ready with my modded hyper raiders and modded fireballs as back ups.
I forgot some of my tricks but overall it was ok. I was just happy that I was able to finally do some wraps in competition and I always just did loop combos in the past.
As always, Grant Johnson and Ryan Lai just destroy the 2A competition completely. Those guys are crazy.
3A started shortly after and I went up with my legacies and projects as back ups.
1st 1/2 was ok, but then got a terrible knot and had to switch to projects.
Only 3 contestants in 3A. Me, Sterling, and Ryan.
Sterling brought some crazy stuff out on stage with his combination 5A/3A, and 4A/3A.
That guy is awesome. And Ryan just amazed us all with his trick flow and technicality.
Time for 4A!
Lots of great competitors in 4A.
I went and joined the rest of the HYPER SCREAMER KEEP YO SOUL TEAM, and we all just went crazy screaming “WOAH!” “AAA!!!” “YABAI!!” and “YUUKI!!!” during Bryan Figueroa’s 4A. It was awesome.
Really amazing 4A freestyles, Look out for Anthony “Jram” Martinez in 4A, his skills are really progressing and I am sure he will be getting closer to the top 3 very soon.
My 4A was ok, Its been almost 2 years since I last competed in 4A, but I still got some tricks to show.
(So many of us are still upset at Justin for not competing. So much money, he owes us all.)
5A finals can be described in 1 word. “EPIC”.
Connor Swan showed some amazing double dice in his 5A, Matthew “Boxthor” Fernandez showed some real nice flow in his tricks on stage, and Charles “Chuck” Haycock does some really nice 5A! I see him do lots of 1A, but his 5A style is really unique and cool. My 5A was ok, I changed yoyos once but overall, I was happy with it.
And of course, the competition is totally blown away by Sterling Quinn. That kid is amazing.
But the highlight for me in 5A?
CLINT “SHADES7” ARMSTRONG.
So I was hanging out with Clint, Connor, and Henvey off stage while he got ready, and he told us, “Hey guys, I am gonna scream YUUKI at some point in my freestyle, and when I do, you guys have to scream it back!”.
I quickly ran down to the competition practice area and told everyone I could about what to do, and then headed back to watch for Clint’s Yuuki battle cry on stage.
About 1 minute 30 seconds in, it happened.
“YUUKIIII!!!”
And everyone screamed back “YUUKIII!!!” Much to the confusion of the audience who had totally no idea what was going on.
But for us who understood what was going on, it was truly an epic moment in yoyo history.
i went to go film more yoyoers including some that were more on the beginner and intermediate side. I never get why in many contest videos, only the really top elite yoyoers are filmed. I mean its good to do this and I know that they are the players that people want to see, but the lesser known and progressing players are part of the contest as well, and you know that it makes them feel really special when they are in a video among some of the best.
Speaking of lesser known players.
Juki? Ok, you have probably seen “Juki” post on yyn and wonder who he is.
He is epic. No question, he is epic. He didn’t compete this year or last year, but he says he will compete next year, he has some of the craziest laceration tricks I have ever seen.
You better compete Juki! Don’t be like JeeJaw Justin! (Thanks to Kumo for the nickname!)
Hey a question. Why was Daniel Dietz at PNWR instead of MA states?
He is from MA and MA states was that same day?
I mean not complaining or anything him going to this contest made it epic! Just wondering.
Time for the 1A finals!
Amazing skills shown once again.
Gentry Stein? Just no way, He had such a clean final freestyle and amazing tricks all the way through. Jacob Jensen had a really nice 1A as well.
My Final did not go that well but I had fun.
Kyle Hedges! Wow, he has a really cool style. His 4A is amazing also but his 1A really surprised me.
You know, I have never seen Colin Leland throw 1A before, but he is quite skilled. Nice style that flows together nicely.
And of course, Jensen Kimmit blew us all away with his amazing trick flow, sidestyle combos, and just crazy tricks.
The freestyles were done. Everyone was left in awe at the skill that was shown at this contest. It was truly awesome.
While the judges calculated the scores, Stu had different people come up on stage to show a trick. I did one of my signature “nom string” tricks, and Clint “YUUKI” Armstrong also did a “nom string” 5A trick. Travis did the CRAZIEST behind the back tether ever, and all of us went up onto the stage to do "non synchronous " synchronized eli hops! Then all of the Seattle yoyoers went up onto the stage to do there signature heart trick (does it have a name anyone?) And Henvey went onto the stage yoyoing while drinking soda, only to have it taken away by Dylan who ran off stage with it with Henvey chasing him. Awesome.
The results were then announced, and here are the PNWR champions!
1A: Jensen Kimmit
2A: Grant Johnson
3A: Ryan Lai
4A: Bryan Figueroa
5A: Sterling Quinn.
A huge congrats to Gentry for getting 2nd in 1A!
Adam Bottiglia ($3.99!!!) for getting 3rd in 2A!
And Zac Rubino for getting 2nd in 4A!
Awesome you guys!
That was it, contest over. So much fun for everyone.
Just cause the contest was over, doesn’t mean that everyone had to leave though!
I hung out a bit more with Dylan, Reed, JeeJaw Justin, Tyler, Juki, Leo, and others.
Filmed some more footage of different yoyoers, sold off my ooch yo and fh1, bought another griffin wing cause I liked my first one so much. filmed Henvey running randomly, filmed somebody’s eye, witnessed an AMAZING magician who happened to come up to us after the contest to congratulate us. and threw a wooly marmot for the first time (Great yoyo by the way).
There was an after party at some restaurant somewhere but I didn’t go. I threw a while longer with Clint and Dylan and we got greeted by people made of clocks with umbrellas wearing all white. (I don’t know?)
Got some dinner, went back to the hotel, and that was it.
What an awesome contest, 2nd time going and it was just as fun if not more then the first. Met so many cool people and saw so many great freestyles.
Competing was fun, screaming was fun, I know a bunch of you guys must have lost your voice a bit, haha.
And seeing me on the news the next morning was very cool.
Very much thanks to the contest organizers, judges, MC’s, Seattle Center, and everyone who made the contest possible. It was a great day for everyone who went there.
If you guys get the chance, try your hardest to get there next year, cause its a contest you just don’t want to miss.
Can’t wait for PNWR 2011!
-J.
