After changing my plans several times, I decided to make my bid to keep the airlines in business by flying to the East Coast of USA for the Highland Park Claymore Challenge and Gravity photo shoot and then to Colorado Crankworx. This was a tough call because I had been invited to ride the elusive Adidas Slopestyle event in Saalbach Austria which happened to be the same weekend as Colorado Crankworx.
Highland Park was amazing and is worth a visit for any freerider. The course they built for the Challenge was pretty gnarly, a week of rain beforehand made the conditions pretty soft but the contest went ahead anyway. I rode pretty conservatively with Crankworx Colorado on the back of my mind and not wanting to be injured for my shot at getting a place for Crankworx Whistler. It was a good time, we got some good shots with Harookz for Gravity.
Next stop, Winterpark Colorado. Showed up and hung out with my mates and legendary course builders Tommy and Foz and Kona guru John Cowan. The course they had sculpted was the best course I had ever seen and I was amping to ride it.
I was riding my Turner and 45 minutes before my qualifying run I blew my rear shock and was devastated I couldn’t find a replacement anywhere. I ended up with no choice but to borrow my friend Foz’s bike which he kindly let me ride for the qualifiers – cheers bra. I had to quickly adapt to this smaller travel bike and managed to put together a solid run including 360-ing the final drop. Advancing into the finals with the pre-qualified riders and added pressure of TV camera’s and a huge crowd I knew I had to step it up. The event was broadcast live on the net and it was cool to have friends around the globe watching. We had two runs in a Semi-Final, my second run was sick and got me into the Final. I didn’t complete my Final run after I over-rotated a 360 flattie but I knew I was sitting pretty as my score from the Semi’s carried over and I placed 7th overall. This also meant I got one of the 3 wild card positions I was after to ride Whistler Crankworx. As Justin Wyper put it, also getting a wild card, I was “jacked up” and got “rowdy” at the after party that night.
Then it was back to Whistler to prepare for the big one.
Pic at Goatstyle - http://www.pinkbike.com/photo/2105003/
Crankworx Colorado coverage:
http://www.pinkbike.com/news/crankworx-colorado-3-208.html - write up and pic
http://www.superhumanmag.com/content/view/739/92/ - video
http://www.sicklines.com/2008/08/03/event-2008-crankworx-colorado-slopestyle-finals/ - write up and pic
http://www.vorb.org.nz/ftopict-83426.html - pic
http://www.vorb.org.nz/photos-view-32917-152-normal-0.html -link to vid
Thanks for readin, Kelly
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