The Focus Show in Review

The Focus Show by all accounts was a success. I can say that with confidence. The main goal of the show was to bring together skateboarding in the North East without all the other crap that is usually grouped in at other trade shows. Unlike the glam Orlando County Arena that hosts Surf Expo, the “Arena” that hosted the TFS was a gritty stripped down hall that still had some championship title banners from the previous Extreme Wrestling events gone by. All of the booth space was filled with either tables from small board companies or pop up tents from national giants. The guys from The Inspire Clothing Trend had a keg of Miller Light and Berentza gave out free shots of social lubrication.
Its hard to say who benefited the most from attending the show. After all, the local and small venders garnered good exposure, the shop owners got to see some of the people on the other end of the phone in person for the first time, and the large companies like Bones, addidas, World, and LRG showed to share some brotherly love. I met some great people and some, interesting, motivated, young companies, like Voyage, Keystone,Skatelamps,and Vengeance to name drop a few. Look for some give aways and product reviews in the future from these and some others here on Interstatemag.
The Mini Ramp Contest was a riot on wheels as shops entered two riders each in one of four heats to battle for cash. In the end Leo Heinert won, Chris Dezimas of NJ Skateshop took second and Kyle Nicholson got third.
The high Ollie winner was Luis Tolentino won the High Ollie Contest at 41″ congrats.
The Premier for Focus Mag’s “Stay Focused” was moved from the Arena to the North Bowl Party due to technical problems. Five cities are featured Philly, Baltimore, Boston, Orlando, New York and DC in the 19 min short but sweet edit. Look for the video to be distributed free in an upcoming issue of Focus Mag and to be free as a download on the Focus web site. In paticular a great job was done on the Florida section filming as well as for the editing on the entire project.
The brother hood on the East Coast is stronger than ever. Thanks to Focus and all who came to support skateboarding!

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