A trio of Kingsland teens made headlines in July when their CAMPUS Surf and Skate X-tour took them beyond Houston to surf waves kicked up to the northeast of Hurricane Dolly.
Chris Ammerman, Cody Hunt and his brother Mazier (Dakota) Banjabbasi recently were joined by Jayme Wood as the first local members of a new organization in the area called CAMPUS Xtreme.
The name CAMPUS is an acronym for Civic and Ministry Professionals United for Students and the Xtreme refers to just about any kind of individual sport that involves moving fast, providing a twist on traditional youth outreach.
The faith-based, faith-supported youth ministry was created to bridge the gap between denominations and to fill gaps in traditional youth programs. In urban areas it has drawn heavy participation and local organizer Gary Johnson hopes he can grow a group here.
“The opinion of the general public is that these guys (Xtreme sports lovers) are like Hell’s Angels,” said Johnson. “Really, they’re great kids looking for a challenge.”
Mrs. Mike (Tina) Claxton in Kingsland is the grandmother of Cody and Dakota. She says she “absolutely approves.”
“I support whatever interest my grandkids are in, if they can make it positive,” she said. “They love skateboarding and they have been able to turn it into a ministry. I’ve prayed for these kids since before they were born.
“At the age they are now, they could be skateboarding and doing drugs, but they’re skateboarding and sharing Jesus with people. I’m excited about this thing.”
Around their homes in Kingsland and Sunrise Beach the four Llano Junior High students don't have a skate park and they wholeheartedly support the idea of seeing one in Llano, But for this summer a CAMPUS X-tour gave them a taste of what was available in other cities.
In addition to the stopover in Surfside, for surfing, they skated parks in Houston, Temple.
They have done some wakeboarding also this summer.
On July 4 at Aqua Boom, a long-time favorite -- the ski show -- was revived. A few area teens like Conner Hart, a Llano High School student from Sunrise Beach, wowed the crowed behind a boat from Highland Lakes Watercraft as part of the CAMPUS Xtreme exhibition of wakeboard and wake-skate tricks to wow the crowd just prior to the fireworks show.
Johnson was there at the microphone for a play-by-play of the wake show. Afterward, as the crowd below the RR 2900 bridge waited for the Aqua Boom fireworks show, he handed out fliers.
“We had never heard of CAMPUS until that day,” said Chris, who along with his friends, Cody and Dakota, was in right away for the surf and skate portions of the CAMPUS X-Tour described in the handout.
A big feature of the tour was a stop in Houston where professional skateboarder Tony Hawk was bringing his skate/bmx bike and motocross exhibition. Huge ramps and a jumbotron screen draw thousands at every stop across the country.
“We really started getting amped when the dirt bikes were revving up,” said Dakota.
They also got to skate the 30,000-square-foot, concrete encrusted Lee and Joe Jamail Skateboard Park in Houston.
The big bonus was Hurricane Dolly. She came to land safely south of their location on July 23 but pushing enough storm power in the Gulf to give the six boys and two leaders on the trip a chance to surf six to eight-foot waves.
Other leaders for the trip were Marc Hebert, a Houston area CAMPUS representative, and Dale Wallace, a junior counselor also from Houston. “Yeah I’ve surfed there before but this was the perfect day,” said Hebert.
“We got out before the waves got dangerous,” Wallace agreed.
The group stayed until late afternoon but hit the road north before 10-foot swells were reported with the major wind and rains.
“We surfed a hurricane,” is the still the first thing the boys say about the trip.
They had stops to skate other Texas venues like Brenham, Killeen and Temple.
“A cool part of the trip was that everywhere we stopped the local skaters wanted to know who we were and, like, how they could join us,” said Chris. “It was kind of like we were celebrities. But we’re nothing special... just skaters and surfers and we were on a mission.”
Johnson said one young boy in Houston accepted Christ on the spot after talking with the group.
Johnson grew up in Central Texas and he got to know this area when his father served as a policeman in Burnet County in the ‘60s and ‘70s. His family had nurtured his Christian faith from boyhood, but the detours and personal tragedies he experienced, were built into a ministry.
Aside from experiences serving churches, Johnson was greatly influenced by a summer in the 1990s as a counselor at Camp Peniel outside Marble Falls.
“I returned to the ‘real world’ after that summer with a desire to do more in terms of giving back to my community and became director of a non-profit youth ministry with inner city youth,” he said.
In 1999 Johnson stepped back into the world of business and enjoyed financial success that just couldn’t compete with old commitments.
“A spiritual mentor from my past came calling in 2003, when Camp Peniel’s founder, ‘Chief’ Gordon Whitelock, asked me to join the staff as a domestic missionary,” he said. “It was the ‘call’ to Peniel that brought me back to the Texas Hill Country.”
He added three years as Peniel Teen Ministries Director to the 18 he has spent in youth work.
“My greatest calling,” said Johnson, “is to work to bridge the great divide (between church denominations) by bringing ministry professionals together for one greater purpose... making the Christian life attractive to those who currently do not find it to be.”
Civic And Ministry Professionals United for Students, he believes, shows consistency and camaraderie between denominations through programs and activities that provide forums to share the good news. Johnson says CAMPUS is a responsible ministry with training much like that for camp counselors for the adults who work with it.
However CAMPUS constantly needs an infusion of adults with experience in the sports kids are interested in, volunteers for travel, for boats for boarding, for equipment.
Johnson has been busy putting together local skate trips to parks in Marble Falls, Burnet and the Texas X Park in Leander while planning a final leg of a CAMPUS X-Tour, but he admits it is something of a pilot program here.
“CAMPUS Xtreme thrives in cities,” he said. “Focusing on this area, we have to have support and volunteer leaders or, this time next year, we might not be here.”
Businesses interested in sponsoring the tour or individuals interested in assisting in the funding of scholarships for local kids on the tour are encouraged to visit campusoftexas.com. Volunteers and youth interested in registering also will find contact information there.