The Original – No Skis, No Tubes, No Bulls#!t
A winter winch mission at a familiar spot with Jeff Mathis, Cole Vanthof, and Shane Bonifay assisting, and the results speak for themselves. It’s always cool to know about an Alliance Wake photoshoot coming up…and, if everything goes as planned, you know it’s going to be a cover shot. Congrats to Blake and the whole crew. It turned out siiiiiick.
Peep the entire Digital Issue HERE!
Sure, he may still rep that Gucci Gang and 1000 BPM music every now and then, but there is another side to Blake that most wouldn’t imagine; he at heart is a calm kid who enjoys just getting away from it all. When you grow up traveling the world riding in contests and having you’re own personal cable park (#BTownCompound) what more would you want, right? Without diving into details Blake’s family now owns a new home on a shit ton of acreage and there are future plans to build arguable one of the dopest cable parks on that land. We’re very, very excited to see this come to fruition.
I meet my buddy and super talented photographer Bradlee Rutledge at Blake’s house in ATL in the morning a few weeks ago to catch up and get some images of Blake riding. It was that classic “let’s get some bangers” at his park initially, but I realized after a few short hours of hanging out that wasn’t what I wanted at all. It’s been done and, of course, we will do it one day, but I wanted to just hang with the kid. You see…I do think Blake has matured tremendously over the past 10-14 months and I was very curious to just see where his head is at.
Blake took Bradlee and me to his new property in Northern Georgia…and it’s out there. I don’t even think I had a cell signal for half the drive. After a gravel road or two and a few cow catcher gates I was blown away by where we had arrived. Without going into too many personal details of the property, lets just say it was the opposite of what I thought Blake liked or would even be into. The kid was grinning ear to ear and was itching to show me around the property on his new Kawasaki side x side. Draped in Carhartt, Blake looked the part of a damn country boy. We kicked it all over the property, from the highest point looking at what appeared to be the base of the Appalachian mountains to the low valley where the natural spring and the future location of his private park is. Quiet and peaceful is an understatement. We were in the middle of nowhere and he loved it. I can’t say that he will be getting any cowboy boots anytime soon, but if he has it his way, he would just stay there all the time I’m sure.
Bradlee took some pictures throughout the day and it’s hard not to see the calm, happy, and content Blake that exudes from him being at his property. I hope he stays focused and comes out swinging this year. I think the calm he is getting from being there will bring the storm out in his riding. Below are a collection of images and only a couple of riding shots. You would think we did a catalog shoot for Bass Pro Shops with these.
We just returned from arguably the best pro wake contest we’ve ever been to: the Slingshot sponsored event properly titled Yardsale held at Valdosta Wake Compound.
This invitation only event was run on a Sesitec System 2.0 course set up unlike anything we’ve ever seen! With one day of practice and three full days of Best Line, Best Feature, and Best Trick, there was no lack of bangers. Our close friend Jeff Mathis took some incredible images that we wanted to share. Watch the video now!
Oh and here is Dom going full taco…he did this twice in a row! And broke two boards!
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Words and video edit by Steffen Vollert
Almost 2 years ago I went to Bangkok to shoot a online part with Victor Salmon, but only a day before I arrived to Thai Wake Park Victor injured his ankle and the whole project was put on hold.
Earlier this year, on my way back home from Australia, I thought it would be a good idea to stop in Bangkok for a week to meet up with him again and finally make it happen.
Luckily Blake Bishop was around at that time too so I was confident to bang out an incredible, next level edit with Slingshot’s Young guns.
With high expectations we started our 5 days of shooting and I was blown away by both of their riding. The first “warmup“ session with Victor on the pipes ( around 2:40 ) was just incredible; almost every shot was a first try. You can tell that he knows his home cable like no one else and his skill on this very technical setup has progressed a lot since I saw him the last time. With his style, Blake brought in the perfect mix. He is one of the most stylish riders I know of and re-viewing his shots after the long days was a great pleasure. His tricks on the double kink rail and the following Indy roll to blind starting around 1:00 were by far my favorite.
For the intro and general theme there was no better way to mix in the madness and the speed of Bangkok to match the level of riding. The song is just a ideal match too and rounded up the whole edit perfectly.
My whole stay at Thai Wake Park, and having the chance to shoot with such talented guys was such a inspiration… Lets do this again soon! Thanks again boys for the good times.
Blake Bishop and Cole Vanthof teamed up with us and Ambush Board Co. to produce a unique video that showcases Blake and his unique style. The entire project only took a month. They found unique winch spots that no one has hit before. And…of course, Blake was destroying his home park in between winch missions. The final UNTAMED video has yielded over 26,000 views and this new UNCUT edit with never-before-seen clips is sure to generate the same kind of buzz.