Feb 15, 2011

Monster Jam Review


If someone would have told me 10 years ago that going to see Monster Trucks would be my idea of a great Friday night, I would have thought they were crazy. But a lot has changed in 10 years...like 4 new men in my life.  And I love anything that makes THEM happy.  So when I had the chance to take them to Monster Jam, I jumped at it.
But I have to admit that it was pretty freaking cool! Since it was my first time, I was a little nervous about the noise and how that would affect the boys.  But I bought ear plugs for the older boys and ear muffs for Bryan and we were all set. 

As we entered the arena the feeling was instantly different than for the many other shows we've seen there.  I was surprised by how many people were there without any kids.  Clearly this is show that spans many generations.

And long before the trucks ever roared into the arena, an announcer was out working the crowd and getting people pumped.  He must have done a really good job because days later, Bryan is still walking around pretending to have a microphone and telling us he wants to be an announcer for Monster Jam when he grows up.

The evening kicked off with a tribute to all the servicemen and woman in attendance and a beautifully sung version of our National Anthem. And then the roar of the trucks as they each ripped around the track and lights flashed.

Grave Digger (a crowd favorite) kicked off the wheelie competition with a little too much air and flipped over, needing some assistance to get right side up. Probably not the way he wanted to start things off but it made for an interesting start for the rest of us. The other 7 trucks made impressive attempts and managed to land on their wheels. This first part of the competition was scored by three judges and left Maximum Destruction as the winner.

Then on to speed portion where two trucks race each other in four separate heats. The winners of those four races move on and so forth down to a final race. Again, Maximum Destruction came out on top!

The last part of the competition is the freestyle event and I have to say, that is by far my favorite. This is when each driver gets one minute to impress the crowd (and the judges) using any part of the track and any tricks they want. This is where the serious crushing, flying and mud spinning happened. While I'm not sure everyone in the crowd agreed with the judges decisions, Monster Mutt won this portion. *Note, if you are seated anywhere in the lower level mud flinging may possibly affect you. We didn't have any land on us but it was flying all around us and we were in the second to last row in the first level.

In between these three competitions there were four wheeler races and a transformer-esp battle which my boys LOVED! Aside from a standard intermission there was very little lapse in activity. When they needed time to reset things the announcer would come out and give away Monster Jam products, such as the new Wii game, hot wheels products and radio controlled trucks.

Overall, if you take advantage of the online ticket promotion, I think this is a great family night for the price.  
Just remember ONLINE promotions are just that, for ONLINE! There was a gentleman in front of me with two young boys at will call trying to purchase $10 tickets and when he was informed that offer wasn't available at the ticket office and only $32 tickets were still available (this was one hour before the event) he took his boys and left!



This is what the track looked like before the Monster Trucks rolled out.


All the trucks lined up!

Grave Digger started out the wheelie competition...he caught a little too much air and went up, up...

and over...

and over.

Grave Digger got a little help getting back out right and was back out for the rest



This is what they looked like after they'd been run over a FEW times!
We came prepared for the noise, but honestly I didn't think it was THAT bad!

This was early on, I promise he loosened up and had a great time!

Puttin in some ear plugs.

1 comment:

  1. WOW.... my son would love that and I considered getting tickets. How was the crowd? I was not sure if it was going to be too rowdy for a 8 yr old ( if there is such a thing ..lol)

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