Thu, 31 Jul 2008Day 3 at the NZO
Posted at 10:30:00 AM
Kiwis can’t fly… but they can ride. Four local boys from NZ landed top spots in today’s men’s slope quals despite the comp getting off to a rocky start this morning. A full day of slopestyle action was on the docket but super gnarly weather put things on hold until noon. The weather delays also caused the 22 ladies who were slated to drop this morning to move straight through to semis. Choice!
The action finally got underway around 1:15 this afternoon amidst high winds, bouts of freezing rain and low visibility. Conditions were subpar, to say the least. Despite it all, 24 riders in session one showed up and battled through everything Mother Nature threw down. Tyler Flanagan from the US finished first in his heat with a run that started off with a frontside boardslide on the hubba rail, 50/50 frontside 180 on the sex change rail, followed by a Cab 5 on the first kicker into a backside 7 on the second, gap to frontside boardslide on the flat down box and finished off with a wallride.
MEN’S SLOPESTYLE SESSION 1 - Results
1 Tyler Flanagan USA VOLCOM
2 Connor Harding NZE K2
3 Kevin Bronckaers BEL ROME
4 Neville Lapwood NZE BURTON
5 Chris Willett USA ZION
6 Sage Kotsenburg USA QUIKSILVER
7 Ben Kilner GBR BILLABONG
8 Raphael Nerz SUI BATALEON
9 Bastian Jauslin SUI SALOMON
10 Akihiro Sato JPN
11 Louis Purucker NZE BILLABONG
12 Tom Grooten NZE K2
13 Chris De Campo AUS BURTON
14 Adam Bowcutt GBR
15 Sebastian Runeare USA ANON
16 Andrew Kennerley NZE
17 Wang Lei CHN BURTON
18 Adam Schwippert USA PODIUM
19 Seamus O Connor USA BURTON
20 Thibault Berard FRA LA PLAGNE
21 Blaze Kotsenburg USA QUIKSILVER
22 Michael McCloy NZE
23 Samuel Cullum GBR ARCUS
24 Alex Harper NZE BURTON
The weather eased off for a minute during session two of the men’s slope quals, enough time to see the true potential of these kids. Then the weather got crappy again. But the damage had been done and Sam Hulbert beat out the other 33 competitors in his heat and rode away with the highest score of the day, a 89.17. He slayed his run by starting off with a frontside 180 on, switch 50/50 180 off on the hubba rail followed by a frontside boardslide to fakie on the sex change rail into switch back to back 9’s, followed by a half Cab 50/50 on the down rail, finishing with a frontside wallride.
MEN’S SLOPESTYLE SESSION 2 - Results
1 Sam Hulbert USA OAKLEY
2 Nick Brown NZE BURTON
3 Nick Hyne NZE RIDE
4 John Murphy USA ANALOG
5 Robbie Walker AUS ANON
6 Mario Käppeli SUI Forum
7 Graham Scott USA QUIKSILVER
8 Kiichiro Kazumi JPN VOELKL
9 Masaharu Ando JPN BONFIRE
10 Nathan Johnstone AUS 32 SNOWBOARD
11 Elliot Catton CAN SAPIENT
12 Roland Morley-Brown NZE FORUM
13 Jye Kearney AUS BURTON
14 Nick Poohachoff USA
15 Clint Allan AUS BILLABONG
16 James Haffner USA BURTON
17 Wes Walsh USA OAKLEY
18 Jordan Rehrer USA
19 Mitch Allan AUS GRENADE
20 Daisuke Masuda JPN CALMANO
21 Nobuo Otake JPN YONEX
22 Iain Burgon NZE
23 Daisuke Hosono JPN HEAD
24 Cline Ingle USA
25 Patrick Davis-Meehan AUS SAPIENT
26 Dmitry Repnikov RUS
27 David Hidalgo Perlas SPA BURTON
28 Sergey Tarasov RUS ANON
29 Richie Heggie CAN
30 Aaron Brownless AUS
31 Dave Nurse NZE BURTON
32 Joeseph MacKenzie NZE QUIKSILVER
33 Max Raymer USA BURTON
