What a great story, GRAOU. Sorry it took me so long to respond. Have a lots of catching up to do in the forums. I think you and Xela share a great story. Congrats on the company1
That must of been one hell of a FLU to inspire you to make the Stampede!
We also have some gorgeous vids : X³ Macadam, by the X³ Team and friends (Toonz, Snake, LauP, Pol0 and Xela) and X³ Stampede promo by SYBLOG and Darrell Mitchell! Special thanks to Grzegorz Wójcik who recently joins the OneDrop Team (congrats!) for its Aeroyo Video Battle Entry with a Stampede!
As usual we’re proud to sponsor contest all around the world, but this one as a special meaning to us as its the Championnat de France 2011 !!!
Finally, remember that we promised you some loaded Stampede, from Jason Wong? Here they are!
We have the results of our French Nats! What an epic moment. Congrats to Anthony “Snake” DESTREMX (1st), Paul “LauP” Régnier (2nd) and Clément “Hatos” BERTAUX (3rd)!. You guys rule!!!
We have announced our politic of designing, here are the changes.
As promised, we have released our second proto : the Aware. Let us know what you think of it.
ZeuS is a concept that I have in mind for a long time.
The idea was to place the weight in 4 points, and to adjust those points according to the desired playability.
I called that afterward the ZS shape. Why?
Here is the sectional shot of the Zeus that emphasizes the ZS shape; we can clearly see the S shape on top. Imagine the other half, you’ll get the Z and you’ll see the ZS.
I annotated these 3 points, by considering the bearing system as the 4th point.
My idea was to move these points and to vary their diameter, in order to adjust the distribution of weight at best.After several questions and several designs, looking for the ideal repartition that will suit my style, ZeuS was born.
The proto is perfect for me, still extreme shape, extreme spin and what seems to be the most stable of our yoyos to this day . Contrary to what some people may think, this yoyo is not heavy, its 66 grams towards its volume, confers a sensation of lightness.
It is not said that the concept of the ZeuS will be the only one. The ZS collection?
After Xela told the story of the ZeuS, it’s my turn to speak about the Aware.
The Aware was born for the first time just after Stampede. I had sharp forms in minds, contrary to my first design. Points, angles… When I showed this design to Xela, least that I can say is that he was not enthusiast. I have to say that I understood him, being myself not completely satisfied; but I knew that I was chasing something good.
A few months later, I took back the plans. I decided to run only a single idea, rather than having several irons in the fire! An empty hub, blank, a yoyo where the distribution of the masses would be made outside and not inside.
What here is thus what has succeeds in the Aware. An inverted work, in a way, because I have for habit to define at first the general shape, and to place then the masses according to the wished play. There, I drew at first this empty hub, and placed my masses all around, obtaining something unconventional, but interesting. Xela agreed. The Aware was born.
As for the name, it is about a private joke which a few Inhabitants of Nantes will understand…
We have some very good videos to show you; first, our friend Riccardo Blanchard is in France for a few days and he stop by to say Hi : R-special in Paris! Our national champion, Anthony “Snake” Destremx made a quick video to show the potential of our new yoyo : La Goutte in action!!!
Yes, La Goutte is ready and is hitting the stores right now. 200 models individually numbered, five delicious colors, 2 bearings (flat and concave), a Graou String. What more could you ask for?
A free la Goutte? OK, let’s do it : new Lucky Number Contest will start soon! Have your Stampede ready .
And if you still encounter troubles with our tight bearings, we have the solution : X³ tools! Perfect for metric and C size bearings.
We hope to meet you during the EYYC 2012, that we’re proud to sponsor! You’ll be able to try TEH YO … yes, it’s a new proto! Slim is good…
Talking about the EYYC 2012, it was a blast! Awesome players, awesome people, awesome place. Here are the results, congrats to Grzegorz “PLAMEK” Wójcik!!! And here are the vids form the team : Anthony DESTREMX, Ixbalam TAPIA and Riccardo FRAOLINI.
And a huge and warm welcome to Rubén Ortíz “Morapio” Fernández too!!! An incredible graphic designer, and skilled player… Logo, engravings, expect more of his incredible work soon .
Our “Play with old stuff win new stuff” contest received many entries, here they are. You can see the results right here. Congrats to Ricardo MELI, Rémi PORTE and JuanMari OTAZO!!!