All weekend long, the concrete Desert West Skateboard Plaza saw heavy skating by some of the world’s best am skateboarders. After qualifying into Sunday’s final in first place, Gonzalez stoked the crowd (and judges) with a perfect final run, stacking difficult tricks well after the buzzer.
Hitting the course with speed, Gonzalez opened by sending a gap-out to frontside lipslide the kink rail, followed by backside 5-0 grind the pool corner, frontside 270 lipslide the A-frame rail, switch backside lipslide the big rail, Caballerial frontside boardslide fakie the rail, overturned 180 to switch crooked the Hubba, frontside blunt the pool corner, backside 180 nosegrind revert the rail, backside nosepick shove-it the quarterpipe and frontside tailslide 270 out the ledge for the win.
Another podium spot at PHXAM 2022 went to newly minted Monster Energy rider and Australian powerhouse Kieran Woolley for attacking the course with a flawless run: Frontside ollie to truck bash over the channel, backside 5-0 transfer over the corner rail, backside lipslide the pool corner, crooked grind up the big rail, frontside 5-0 the handrail, backside noseblunt the quarter pipe, frontside Smith grind the rainbow rail, egg plant revert the pool corner, frontside boneless disaster the quarter pipe, kickflip varial Indy the pool corner and switch crooked grind the rail showcased Woolley’s all-terrain skills for second place at PHXAM 2022.
In the “Cash-or-Crash” Best Trick contest, Woolley had the crowd on its feet with a parallel-footed grind over the rainbow rail that must be seen to be believed. Also stashing some Best Trick money, Monster Army rider Liam Pace put his larger-than-life transition skating skills on full display, including a shove-it noseslide the pool corner and high-speed crooked grind the rainbow rail.
In Saturday’s qualifiers, Monster Energy’s Filipe Mota from Brazil earned a Golden Ticket straight into the finals by posting flawless tech moves across the course. The 15-year-old’s highlights included bigspin frontside boardslide and kickflip frontside boardslide the rail, frontside noseslide fakie, and noseslide to crooks the Hubba, backside lipslide the tall rail, and kickflip backside tailslide the tall Hubba. Mota finished PHXAM 2022 in tenth place.