The course at Highlands. I'm pretty sure landing on dirt hurts more than on snow.
Backflip!
Last Saturday was a big day in Northern New Hampshire. Two events were going on and it was my good fortune to need to be at both of them. At Highlands Mountain there was a pro mountain bike slopestyle: the first Claymore Challenge. Highlands is really pushing freestyle mountain biking on the east coast with their progressive terrain--for this competition they carved a huge dirt slopstyle course in sideways snaking lanes--filled with gap jumps, a hip, a wooden quarter pipe, a huge wall ride, the Aaron Chase signature feature (which was like the mountain bike equivalent of a roof-shaped butter box), and a big booter at the end. I was at Highlands for Friday's practice and Saturday's competition, and while I saw a lot of backflips, I also witnessed a lot of spinning, supermaning and a move actually called the humper--all things that look pretty gnarly on a bike because if you fall there's a lot of metal to impale yourself on.
This is another reason biking is crazier than snowboarding: hiking back up with a bike. no fun.
Seat grabber.
Pro bikers came out from all over the US and Canada to hit the course, a fairly good-sized crowd assembled and DJ ZJ from Burlington's Lotus Entertainment spun tunes (mountain bikers are the most picky athletes about their music I have ever seen. no: Chicago, Britney Spears. yes: Rage Against the Machine, Metallica. Wait, maybe that's more obvious than I first thought?). The riders competed against each other for first place: bragging rights, respect from their peers, money, and a giant five-foot-long knight's sword. Second place: a smaller sword, and third, in no way a reference to the finisher's manly ability to spin and flip their way down a serious dirt course: a dagger.
Bikes.
Super leg kick.
I'm not sure how this actually works, but he landed it.
If I had a better camera, this wouldn't look blurry, but you get the idea. The wallride was big.
Results:
Pros:
1st: Cam McCaul
2nd: Andrew Taylor
3rd: Aaron Chase
Ams:
1st: Phillip Kmetz
2nd: David Blachura
3rd: Andrew Davies
A little further up 89 at the West Lebanon Skatepark was the second installment of Embasi's DC Crowned King summer skate series. This is seriously one of the raddest summer events in Northern New England--everyone comes out for this: a huge showing of the New Hampshire skate scene, local industry heads, tons of spectators and of course all the guys from Embasi. I ran up there from Highlands and caught semis and finals, and once again, despite humidity and blazing sun, young and old skaters alike were sessioning hard, having fun, and providing excellent visual entertainment.
The line up.
The quarter is always sessioned pretty heavy.
R. Kelly and John Huff were there representing the Embasi skate team. Huff was floating 180s over the stair set and was charging super consistently on the rail side of the park. Tyler Lynch was up from Vermont and was spreading his smooth style all over the place like peanut butter on dinner rolls. That guy never ceases to impress.
R. Kelly getting up there.
Tyler Lynch is ridiculous. And he's actually this blurry in real life. Some variation on back 1 tail stall front 1 out--whatever it was he executed it perfectly, leading to his eventual win of the comp.
With one Crowned King left (Saturday, August 16th), the intermediate group was vying for position going into the last event, where the top overall skater will receive a trip to Woodward. The older crew, well they're just stoked to skate, I think, right?
Thanks to Keith and the whole Embasi crew, those guys are awesome, as well as Mark and everyone at Highlands, and DJ ZJ for hanging out with me even though I came to NH directly from being stuck in the airport for two days and didn't have my luggage (ie clean clothes).
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