The caption on the box reads, “A 35-minute glimpse into the world of wakeboarding and wakeskating like it’s never been seen before.” After watching this video, this statement held its truth. It seems as though the last few videos to hit the market resembled each other quit a bit, at least this was the attitude I had before watching the latest film from 601 filmgroup. I thought I would be in for another dose of the same couple of riders, double rolls and very little footage of the women riders and wakeskating. Little did I know, I was in for a great surprise.
Concept
The concept of Beg Borrow and Steal is simple: Sliding, wakeskating, sliding on wakeskates, more sliding and more wakeskating. It holds the usual format of filming great wakeboarding from several different riders in various locations, but they didn’t devote full sections to one specific rider throughout the whole segment. They put as many riders in each section as possible and were able to show a lot of riders doing a lot of new things. 601 captured some very outstanding riding and sliding this time around and added even more flavor with some very impressive wakeskating.
Cinematography
Because of the amount of sliding in the video, a lot of it could be shot from land instead of from inside of the towboat or chase boat. And it also looks as if some clips were shot while standing on the apparatus itself. They used some cool angles and were able to show different views of the same trick due to the cameraman being grounded and a view from the water.
Length
While waiting for winter to pass or on rainy days, wakeboarding videos can never be long enough. Beg runs for 38 minutes and for the most part the time is split up nicely between each rider and each segment. There is a section in the middle of the video of some moto x riding that we felt was rather lengthy, but it is some very exciting footage and a little break from the water.
Music
The music in Beg, Borrow and Steal is very good. Some really explosive high energy tracks were used during the more hardcore sliding and riding segments while a smooth hip hop beat flows with some of the more stylish riding. Some of the groups featured in Beg are: Brother of Soul, Green Gorilla Lounge, Mustard Plug, Karl Densen and Double “O”.
Riding
The riding in Beg is outstanding. It is hardly the same old tricks behind the boat and it really shows the direction that our sport is going in. Some new faces were also captured in the making, which was really nice to see. Some of the riders showcased in Beg are Byerly, Watson, Grubb, Wright, Bonifay, Ruck, Kent, McKee bros, Lutgert, Owens, McGuckin, Sharpe, Heavener, Wulf and more.
Get On It
The first section starts off with Danny Harf and Chad Sharpe hitting a slider that had to be at least a good three-foot ollie. As usual, this isn’t enough, so they add another higher section, which slopes down to the already existing piece, and use a floating kicker ramp to step up on to it. Harf and Sharp display some sick skills across this erector set looking apparatus.
Sliding Sessions
Scott Byerly and his brother Ryan session the roof of an old wooden boat that again required an ollie of at least three feet. And both of them finished off every slide with a sweet spinning dismount. Brandon Meek joins in on the action, as him and Scott Byerly tear up a gap slider on their skates. Meek and Byerly both attack the gap on their wakeskates and also show some very talented riding behind the boat. The sliding on the skate is impressive, but Byerly’s 360 pop shuvits, wake to wake board varials, huge ollies, and floaty wake jumps shows that Scott has definitely been spending a lot of time on the skate. There is also an interesting shot where Meek misses the gap between the two sliders. As he flies out of harms way, his skate slams into the edge of one of the pvc pipes and just sticks there. He then walks over and yanks on his board to release it from the pipes. The scene ends with some more boat sliding by Scott Byerly.
On The Road
Kyle Murphy, Leslie Kent, Samantha Owens and Buster Lutgert hit the road with boat in tow for a day on the water with the girls (what a lucky guy). Owens displays an array of stylish inverts and spins. Kyle Murphy quickly gets to work with some huge air and a lot of backside rotations. Buster Lutgert steps it up with a huge whirly, a wrapped KGB and a moby dick. Finally Leslie Kent takes to the water and sticks a sweet Pete Rose on her first trick. She follows that up with a grabbed heelside 3, grabbed toeside 3 and then a grabbed toeside 5.
Stylin
Drew McGuckin goes off the hook on his wakeskate. He too hit the same gap slider as the previous skaters, but his tricks off the wake are phenomenal. Everything is big and is super clean. Wake to wake board varials, wake to wake body varials and huge grabbed 180’s are to name a few. Collin Wright then breaks into the scene and throws an absolutely huge backside 360 off of a double up. He is as stylish as ever and shows his slider and wakeskating skills as well. The section then goes into some killer moto x riding.
Can you say wakeskating
Scott Byerly and Brian Grubb start off the next section of the video and absolutely tear it up. They do some more unbelievable tricks off of the wake and again hit gap slider, but this one is engineered a bit different. It is a John boat flipped over and it steps up to another flat bar about 5 feet off of the water. Grubb showcases his balance in this section and takes the slider on one footed. He also does some one foot wake jumps, spins off of the slider, and numerous variations of spins across the flat bar. Shawn Watson also makes a few frontside attempts at the gap step up on the skate and eventually sticks one.
The Crocodile Hunter
A few riders were lucky enough to travel to Australia for some riding and were even luckier to visit Steve The Crocodile Hunter and his wife while they were there. Watson then takes to the water on his wakeboard and displays his stylish spins and his huge inverts. 720’s off the wake are effortless and everything is grabbed. Some Australian scenery is also shown between Watson’s tricks.
Pointless Posse
When the Pointless Posse hits the water, there is no telling what kind of crazy stuff will happen. Chad Sharpe, Danny Harf, François Roy, Shane Bonifay, Erik Ruck, and Brian Grubb all take turns throughout the section showing their skills. Some of the riding is behind the boat on the wake, but most of it takes place on some kind of slider made of wooden picnic tables and some type of metal rail. It must have been a fun slider to make Grubb strap on some bindings to hit it on a wakeboard. There is nothing else to say about the level that these guys are pushing their riding to and the sport to. It has to be viewed personally to appreciate exactly how sick these guys can get.
McKee Brothers
Jeff McKee and brother Billy McKee are featured in this section and are definitely two guys to watch ride. Both of them are very stylish, take everything big and get their grab on. Huge off axis spins, double grab 540’s, indy tantrum to blind and heelside 720’s are just a few tricks that these guys have up their sleeves. These are surely some kids to watch out for in the future.
More Wakeskating
This section must have been added just to let everyone know that wakeskating is about to blow up. Once again Byerly and Grubb session the flipped over johnboat with yet again another set of unbelievable stunts. Some filming was also done from another wakeskater being pulled tandem for this run that results in some really cool angles. Byerly takes a mean spill that is captured on film and they move the boat around for Grubb to master the slider frontside. The movie then comes to a close, but shows a friendly competition of beer jumping while the credits roll. A garbage can was set up on a platform in the water and on top the garbage can were stacks of beers and beer cases. The object was to see who could ollie over the highest stack. You will have to watch for yourself to see who the winner is.
Rating
Beg Borrow and Steal accomplished their goal of showing a new look at our sport. They flooded this video with awesome wakeboarding, incredible wakeskating, sick sliding and an array of various riders doing it all. 601 also got the perfect shots, added a killer soundtrack and broke away from the usual wakeboarding video format. The use of so many different riders alone made the video very interesting and the fact that a lot of them were new faces will keep your eyes glued to the screen. We were very impressed with the amount of wakeskating in this video and will definitely mark this one up as a benchmark in the filming of our sport. For these reasons, we give Beg Borrow and Steal 4.75 out of 5 stars. We look forward to seeing more videos from 601 Filmgroup and we hope that they continue to break away from the normal stuff and bring us all something new and improved.
