VANS BOWL-A-RAMA ft. Steve Caballero

I recently attended the Vans BOWL-A-RAMA skateboarding competition at Bondi Beach. It’s been a while since I’ve been to Bondi Beach (there’s just too many people!) but as soon as I got there I remembered just how beautiful it was. There were people EVERYWHERE on the beach and at the skate comp. but it was all worth it.



The Vans Kombi was out showing off with some pretty cool decorations.


Vans has been around for a while now and is the preferred choice of skater shoes for over 30 years. The “OFF THE WALL” brand was created during the era of my favourite skaters like Tony Alva, Stacey Peralta and Jay Adams. It’s rumoured that the slogan came about when Alva and Peralta was skating at an empty pool one afternoon and a skater went off the wall and airborne for a bit. After that the two skate legends just kept on saying “That’s off the wall!” and it just so happened a few guys from Vans was skating there too and hence the birth of the slogan “OFF THE WALL”.

This was the so called “line” to see the action. Waited in line for an hour and a half before we got a seat.

The place was packed out. Not a good time to be short either!

Luckily I had Paul and his girlfriend there to keep me company. Thanks for picking me up bro!

There were some awesome local talent too. Kids as young as 10 years old were dropping in and carving it up. I wish I was 10 and had no fear.

After the locals carved it up, some officials began cleaning up the Bowl for the big event.


Steve Caballero is a skateboarding legend. Picked up by Powell Peralta since the beginning and one of the members of the Bones Brigade; skating alongside Tony Hawk himself. He also invented the “Caballerial” trick which I had the honour to see live. It was awesome!

Here’s a short vid I took of Caballero skating the Bondi Bowl. Enjoy ;)

VANS BOWL-A-RAMA 2011: Steve Caballero skating the bowl! from Herman Phung on Vimeo.