BOWLZILLA Gold Coast 2024 Finals

For the ninth year in a row BOWLZILLA Gold Coast delivered the Australian Skateboarding Federation’s National Park Skating Championships to a raging audience and a raucous field of competitors. There were big differences this year in both and as a result everyone in attendance said it was the best one for years.

Energy levels were high and everyone there was up for the best day’s skating on the Gold Coast all year. So a bit of rain and a lot of humidity did not deter anyone. The crowd stayed through the showers and pitched in to dry the bowl during the breaks in rain and screamed louder for everyone each time the skating took off again. There’s no crowd like a Gold Coast skate crowd.

BOWLZILLA Gold Coast 2024 FORMAT

7.00 – 9.40 OPEN PRACTICE

16 and Under Eliminations: Format: 3 Heats: 3 x 40 second runs + 10 minutes practice, best run counts, top 8 scores of competition advance to Final.

9.40 – 10.00         Practice

10.00 – 10.30       Heat 1

10.30 – 11.00       Heat 2

11.00 – 11.30       Heat 3

Women’s Eliminations: Format: 3 Heats: 3 x 40 second runs + 10 minutes practice, best run counts, top 8 scores of competition advance to Final.

11.30 – 11.50      Practice

11.50 – 12.20        Heat 1

12.20 – 12.50        Heat 2

12.50 – 1.20          Heat 3

Open Eliminations: Format: 3 Heats: 3 x 40 second runs + 10 minutes practice, best run counts, top 8 scores of competition advance to Final.

1.20 – 1.40          Practice

1.40 – 2.10          Heat 1

2.10 – 2.40          Heat 2

2.40 – 3.10          Heat 3

Lunch

3.10 – 3.30         

FINALS:

16 and Under Final: 8 skaters, 3 x 40 second runs, best run counts

3.30 – 3.40           Practice

3.40 – 4.00           Final

Master’s Final: 8 skaters, 3 x 40 second runs, best run counts

4.00 – 4.10          Practice

4.10 – 4.30          Final Jam

Women’s Final: 8 skaters, 3 x 40 second runs, best run counts

4.30 – 4.40           Practice

4.40 – 5.00           Final Jam

Open Final: 8 skaters, 3 x 40 second runs, best run counts

5.00 – 5.10           Practice

5.10 – 5.30           Final

AWARDS:

5.45 – 6.00

COMPETITION FORMAT:

16 and Under: 3 Heats – 8 person heats, 3 x 40 second runs, best run counts, top 8 scores advance, each heat is based on 10 minute warm up. 8 best scores advance to Finals.

Masters: smaller field this year, will run a straight Final.

Yeah Girl Women: 3 Heats – 8 person heats, 3 x 40 second runs, best run counts, top 8 scores advance each, heat is based on 10 minute warm up. 8 best scores advance to Finals.

Open: 3 Heats – 8 person heats, 3 x 40 second runs, best run counts, top 8 scores advance each, heat is based on 10 minute warm up. 8 best scores advance to Finals.

16 and Under FINALS: 8 skaters, 3 x 40 second runs, best run counts. Judges will rank skaters 1 – 8.

Masters FINALS: 8 skaters, 3 x 40 second runs, best run counts. Judges will rank skaters 1 – 8.

Yeah Girl Women FINALS: 8 skaters, 3 x 40 second runs, best run counts. Judges will rank skaters 1 – 8.

Open FINALS: 8 skaters, 3 x 40 second runs, best run counts. Judges will rank skaters 1 – 8.

BOWLZILLA™ Gold Coast 2024 JUDGING

JUDGING:

Three (3) judges with one (1) acting as head judge who will also score. Head judge ensures other judges are understanding of format and judging criteria.

BOWLZILLA™ is a park competition and therefore will be judged according to park skating style. Park skating has its emphasis on style and flow. Tricks are complementary to the riders run rather than being the focus of the run.

Judging is based on:

Use of the bowl: Each park is unique and therefore requires a unique approach. Elanora park has these things to consider use of in a line: two ends, full pipe, corners, hips and extension. A well-rounded run in this park will utilise as many of these features in a fluid park skating approach. If a skater spends the majority of their time utilising just one area of the park performing tricks, their run will be scored down.

Style: the fluid linking of park features and how individual tricks are performed within the run (i.e. continuity of line).

Content: park skating dictates that tricks are complementary to the whole run. If the tricks appear awkward and singular rather than part of the whole run they may be marked down. If the tricks are fluid and complimentary to the run then; the number, difficulty, originality and variety of tricks successfully performed will add to the score.

Note: These categories are weighted by the individual judge’s subjective opinion. Judge’s decision is final. Skateboarding is judged subjectively rather than objectively so it is fair to assume different people will have different ideas on results.

Run points:

Scoring is out of 100 per run.

The top two scores will be taken and the bottom two scores will be thrown away. In the event of a tie the riders other scores will be taken into consideration to form a tie breaker.

The top 8 scored riders will go through to the final. The final riders are chosen by top score across all heats and not by top skaters from each heat.

Run point distribution for judging guidance; 90-100 best runs of day – these runs should sit between; 90-100 and are usually reserved for the finals to ensure a lifting of scores throughout the competition. 80-90 top scoring heat runs sit within this range. A run within this bracket will consist of use of whole bowl, fluid and fast approach, tricks are complementary to the run and there is a variety with a mix of difficulty and originality. 70-80 runs within this range are generally smooth and consistent, use the whole bowl, fill the allotted time of 35 seconds per run but may not have the most spectacular approach. 60-70 a rider may not complete a run but within their run may use the bowl well and do some amazing tricks or a rider may do a very trick focused run that only utilises a portion of the bowl rather than all of it or the rider may be consistent but not perform a run that stands out against the other skaters. 50-60 a rider may only last 5 or 6 walls but do a couple of tricks that really stand out but did not have a long enough run or the rider may use the whole time but not perform a spectacular run that stands out. 30-50 the skater dropped in a got one or two tricks but nothing was spectacular. 0-30 the skater dropped in and did nothing.

Falls:

A subjective penalty will be assessed, and the following will be taken into consideration when determining the amount of penalty: First wall rebate; if the rider falls on the very first wall, they get to rebate but the clock keeps going. Not the second wall. The rider must race to restart their run as quickly as possible. If the skater chooses to rebate it is within the 40 seconds, the clock does not start over. When the clock hits 40 seconds the run is over, regardless of when the rider decides to start their run. What was being attempted when the fall/step off occurred? How the overall fluidity of the run was affected. Ability to recover and continue the continuity of the run.

SAVE THE DATE: BOWLZILLA Gold Coast 2024

BOWLZILLA Gold Coast Skating on Cloud Nine

BOWLZILLA Gold Coast is celebrating nine years of ripping this February 24th. Friends, family and fans are all rolling in for Australia’s biggest week of Park Skating. The Australian Skateboarding Federation National Park Skating Championships will be bigger and better than ever.

A week of skating in Australia’s favourite destination has already got skaters near and far getting their crew together and booking travel. The ninth annual skating festival on the Gold Coast is full up with; Learn To Ride clinics, Art Shows, workshops, Music, Parties, Food and the Competition. BOWLZILLA Gold Coast will be riding high on Cloud 9 this year.

The main event at BOWLZILLA Gold Coast is the Australian Skateboarding Federation’s National Park Skating championships for 2024. With inclusive divisions across all ages, abilities and sexes, the cross pollination of generations and styles ensures the greatest week of skating in Australia. Maintaining the largest Equality in Skateboarding event in Australia with equal prize purse across the Open and Women’s divisions is just one of the key ingredients making the celebrations such a success. Adding in the Open prize purse, cash for the Masters and prizes for the 16 & Under Amateur division, almost everyone goes home with something awesome.

BOWLZILLA Gold Coast is supported by Experience Gold Coast and the Queensland Government through Tourism and Events Queensland and features on the It’s Live! in Queensland events calendar. Promoting the celebration to a much wider audience is incredibly important in bringing greater awareness and better support for our community. We’re showing the best of friend’s skating to the world and encouraging them to come and be part of it all.

The City of Gold Coast have backed skating since forever and are continuously proactive in working with skaters to find ways of supporting them and encouraging their successes. It is not just the fact they have more skateparks per capita than anywhere else in the country but how they have supported the women’s skate scene with previous successes such as the workshops, activations and art shows, the many and varied skate events that have been both funded and supported across ages, styles and levels of expertise and also the grass roots opportunities they provide by working with Gold Coast Skateboard Coaching and so many others in the community. All of this comes to a culmination in the festivities that are BOWLZILLA Gold Coast every year.

“The Gold Coast’s star continues to shine with fantastic events like BOWLZILLA back for 2024,” said Gold Coast Mayor Tom Tate.

“I welcome the international competitors to the city as they battle with Australia's top skateboarders at Elanora and urge locals to get involved in the week-long expo which supports BOWLZILLA, offering free skate sessions and seminars from the pros."

Chad Ford; BOWLZILLA – Director: “Our focus each and every year has always been the excuse to gather or friends and family from near and far and celebrate their talents and share all the best our community has to offer. Grinding into our ninth year on the Gold Coast is no small feat and we are looking forward to stepping up to the challenge of ensuring this year will be our biggest and best yet. Our friends and family are the greatest and we invite you all to come and celebrate them with us at this year’s BOWLZILLA Gold Coast!

21st February: Girl’s Learn To Ride Clinic – Tugun Skatepark

22nd February: SALKZILLA

23rd February: Gold Coast Grill – local hosted BBQ skate session

24th February: BOWLZILLA™ Gold Coast, Australia’s; National Park Skating Championships

24th February: Dive In – official after party – Rattlesnake Motel

BOWLZILLA Gold Coast 2023 Highlights

Beautiful one day, ripping the next. The BOWLZILLA Gold Coast highlights clip is here to warm up the southern winter with a scorching summer recap – watch, enjoy and GO SKATE.

Higher, faster, longer, funner. Competitions can push skaters to challenge themselves and risk that little bit more. The best of it is when they’re pushing their mate in the next run to do better than they just did. Yeah, people won but that wasn’t ever the point. Nothing and no one was left behind this year and everyone celebrated together at the end. BOWLZILLA Gold Coast 2023 was a uniform free zone of rad times and ripping skating.

The Gold Coast skate scene is massive and growing with so many rad spots and generations of shredders keeping the torch lit it is no wonder that it is being called the skate mecca of Australia. Everyone’s welcome to come and grind the epic concrete and share in the stoke of it all.

It’s the community that makes BOWLZILLA Gold Coast happen and as rad as it is. Without their support it just isn’t possible to have festivals like these. The week is really a celebration of how epic they all are. Watch the shredding in the 16 & Unders, Masters, Yeah Girl Women and Opens and you'll see the next step that Australian skating took in 2023.

Sponsors and partners like; Dickies, Santa Cruz, Independent, Kangol, Yeah Girl, Gold Coast Skateboard Coaching, Australian Skateboarding Federation, Truckstop, Fuel TV, Girl’s Skate Gold Coast, Etnies, Rattlesnake Motel, Gold Coast City Council and Tourism & Events Queensland made sure everyone got thanked properly.

Massive shout outs go to all the friends, family, fans, media, sponsors, supporters, community, crew, and skaters for what was truly one of the best years ever for BOWLZILLA Gold Coast.