A few years ago, Volcom put up a cool $10,000 for the first person to land a kickflip on a surfboard. Everyone and their mom started landing on their fins in a quest for the almighty buck, but for a long time, no one actually nailed one. Then a funny little guy from Santa Cruz named Zoltan Torkos did one. Everyone freaked out, kind of. It was pretty impressive, but Volcom didn’t seem too impressed.
“Zoltan’s kickflip is clearly below the lip and not a real air,” they said in a press release. “Zoltan has pulled the first kickflip on a surfboard, but the $10,000 still remains up for grabs.”
According to rule number three that Volcom set forth for their contest,
The kickflip must be a real air “above the lip” – No backwash, No chop hops, or anything in the flats or below the lip of the wave.
Zoltan, understandably was a little miffed. But being Zoltan (one of the cheeriest guys on the planet), he kept his chin up and his nose to the grindstone. After a public outcry, though, Volcom ponied up and lined Zollie’s pockets with the promised 10 gs, which, considering he didn’t actually do what they said was necessary, was pretty cool of them. They even turned around and said they’d up the ante and award $20,000 to the first person to do an off-the-lip kickflip. The contest, which started in November of 2007, is supposed to run until there’s a winner, which hasn’t happened yet… but Zoltan’s still out there giving it his all. And from the looks of this video, he’s got them pretty dialed. Still not off-the-lip, but two on one wave (and a thousand other times, all on YouTube) prove that this isn’t a fluke.
