FUEL TV: Maloof Money Cup

The 2009 Maloof Money Cup is over and Chris Cole dominated the street course and walked away $100,000 richer. Alex Perleson blew away a line-up of legends and took the title in men's vert. "This is the future," Bob Burnquist told the Maloof Money Cup audience during awards as 18-year-old Perelson walked away with first place in vert and $75k for his efforts.

The Maloof Money Cup has a ton of hype behind it, and rightly so. It is quite possibly the best contest for street skaters and vert skaters alike. Nowhere else do you find a course designed by the skaters in the contest with votes on features and dimensions. It all comes down to the fact that the Maloof brothers care about skateboarding. This year the Maloof Money Cup did not disappoint. Some incredible, ground breaking skating happened in every area. The girls threw down like true champs (one girl even knocked her head hard, went to the hospital and was back in time to win the Zumiez Destroyer award) and pushed the level of competitive skating up a few pegs. The vert and street sections were so tightly packed with tricks that people will be talking about it for months.

A few highlights: Alex Perelson laid down the fourth ever 900 in the Men’s Vert Finals, but that was just the beginning. Bob Burnquist used the mini-mega ramp set up during the jam format section of the vert contest and was putting together some incredible combos. Moving it over to street we had huge gaps being thrown down by, the one and only, Ryan Sheckler who looks like he hurt his elbow right at the buzzer but kept it going strong. Dennis Busenitz skated twice as fast as anyone else and had the crowd on his side at all times. Nyjah Huston proved to everyone how consistant he really is by nailing flip to grind tricks all day. Tommy Sandoval got as gnarly as anyone, finding all the big gaps and drops the course had to offer, he definitely earned that second place finish. Chris Cole killed every section of the course with an amazing mix of tech and gnar like only he can. There were no trick combos going cold in the finals and the level of skating was truly legendary. Here are the results from the contest as well as some photos to catch you up on what went down, or re-live the amazing event in HD on FUEL.TV/maloofmoneycup. And check out what happened the last few days as well.

Men's Street Finals
1) Chris Cole 91.75
2) Tommy Sandoval 90.33
3) Nyjah Huston 90.25
4) Torey Pudwill 89.58
5) Ryan Sheckler 89.25
6) Sean Malto 85.67
7) Greg Lutzka 85.58
8) David Gonzalez 81.42
9) Paul Rodriguez 80.00
10) Mark Appleyard 79.58

Best Trick
Adam Dyet won it with a number of tricks including a kickflip backside tailslide on the long Rincon rail, and a switch backside heelflip down the 4 block.
So many more memorable tricks went down in this 25 minute jam session, a few of the highlights are: Nyjah Huston fakie 360 flipped the 4 block. Billy Marks nollie inward heelflipped and cab kickflipped the 4 block. Mike Mo Capaldi did a switch 360 flip and switch backside flipdown the 4 block, both perfect. Torey Pudwill backside 360 kickflipped the 4 block. Sierra Fellers nollie flip boardslid the long rail. Chris Cole did a bunch of stuff, most notabley, backside 270 lipslide on the tall rail. Pete Eldridge was a crowd favorite all weekend and spent his time skating the high bar section of Rincon and rolled awat from a switch ollie over the bar to switch lislide down the rail and a contest ending switch heelflip over the high rail. 

Men's Vert Finals
1) Alex Perelson
2) PLG
3) Bob Burnquist
4) Andy MacDonald
5) Buckey Lasek

Girl's Street Finals
1) Leticia Bufoni
2) Lacey Baker
3) Elissa Steamer
4) Amy Caron
5) Marisa Dal Santo

Unfortunately, a recent knee surgery will be keeping Braydon sidelined at the Maloof Money Cup this year, but you can count on seeing (and definitely hearing him on the mic) at the contest this weekend. He's fired up to cheer everybody on and was down to take a minute to weigh in on what sets the Maloof contest apart and how sweet revenge will be on the spot that took him out. Watch all the action LIVE on FUEL.TV's webcast.
(Photo: Tal Roberts)

FUEL.TV: How did you get involved with the Maloof’s?
Braydon: Since I’m from Las Vegas, there’s a lot of people I knew from out there and one of my good friends, her sister is engaged to one of the Maloofs. She’s the one who kept on pushing my name to them. Sayin’ that they couldn’t disinclude a skater from Vegas. So they hit me up and it’s cool, they’ve been treating me good ever since.

FUEL.TV: Which feature did you get to design for the course this year?
Braydon: I think it’s the third obstacle that people are going to hit. It’s called the Mike Carroll obstacle. It’s an exact copy of the… oh wow… I’m driving by the funeral home right now where they’re burying… what’s the girls name that died the same day as Michael Jackson?

FUEL.TV: Farrah Fawcett.
Braydon: Yeah, yeah. They’re burying her right now, and there’s a bunch of paparazzi and everybody around.

FUEL.TV: So, which obstacle is it?
Braydon: Oh yeah. It’s this thing that’s out in Barcelona that Stefan Janoski and Mike Carroll skated. I just thought that it looked amazing and I always wanted to go there. It’s a step-up box. You ride on the step-up box and it leads to this slanted uphill ledge, then that goes into a bank. I think some good stuff will go down on that. I’m pretty excited to watch people flop around it.

FUEL.TV: Why is the Maloof Contest the one that brings out all the guys that you never really get to see in contests?
Braydon: I think it’s the principle of how it’s held. It is held by a big corporation, but they give us creative control over it. Unlike the X-Games and the other contests that kinda have boundaries where you’re allowed to do this and this and you can get in trouble for doing this. With Maloof, they asked us “What do you guys want this to look like and how do you want this to go down?” I think that alone is enough that everybody got very excited over it and it feels a bit better. Everybody’s into skateboarding for the same reason, there’s no rules, there’s no boundaries, no anything. It’s good that these guys are willing to let us throw our own contest, but at the same time, you have the perks of the Maloofs, who have everything.

(Photos Courtesy Emerica)

FUEL.TV: Who are you most excited to see skate at the contest this year?
Braydon: The line-up this year is pretty intense. It looks amazing. I’ve seen Sean Malto, that kid just blows my mind every time I watch him skate, he’s really, really ridiculous. It’s gonna be real exciting to watch Lizard, just see what he can do this year. He’s definitely a character that’s able to stick to walls and do things that people normally can’t.

FUEL.TV: Yeah, I was psyched to see him in the Wallenberg event. He’s did such different tricks from what everybody else was trying.
Braydon: Yeah, that was a really fun day. He’s just exciting to watch and he blows my mind in every which way. He’s really a natural talent at skateboarding.

FUEL.TV: Are you gonna be able to skate or is your knee still hurt?
Braydon: Unfortunately I’m still hurt. I’m just gonna be one of the people on the microphone shouting out names. Giving everybody big ol’ “What’s ups.”

FUEL.TV: How long until you’ll be able to skate?
Braydon: It was my ACL I had surgery two and a half months ago, so I should be skating by the end of August. It was actually one of the surgeries that used to be a real bad surgery but now thing have changed. I’m already running around and people that are standing next to me can’t even tell that I had surgery. I should be pretty healthy in the next month or two.

FUEL.TV: What do you have planned for when you’re back skating?
Braydon: There’s some tricks I’ve had in my mind that I just can’t get out. They’re pretty well plastered in there. Definitely the trick that took my ACL from me, and I can’t wait to just go laugh at that spot when I conquer it.

FUEL.TV: What did you get hurt on?
Braydon: The Santa Monica 14. I can’t wait till I get to look back at that little mountain and be really happy to just yell “screw you” at it. It took my life for a couple months, but I can’t wait to conquer it again.
(Photo Courtesy Emerica)

FUEL.TV: Is there anything else you want to say about the Maloof Money Cup?
Braydon: I just want to say that it’s gonna be one hell of a good event. This weekend it gonna be pretty wild and I can see kids and everyone that’s around there and part of it being very excited. I hope all the best luck to all the skaters in it.