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| ...and there were a pretty decent amount of flatlanders, too. A couple NE riders that haven't been seen in some years were present, including Rich Upjohn (riding his General Osborn Pro), Ben Swire, Rick MacDonald, and Andrew Parrish. The Expert class had Jon Kenniston taking first place, followed by old-time KOF 16 & up Expert rivals myself and John Cote. But the big surprise (for me) was the kid who got fourth: Marcel Trembley from Connecticut. He was doing some pretty rad front wheel switching combos as well as good back wheel links, too, and in practice it looked like he'd really give the Expert riders a run for their money. While most of Expert class riders have at least 10 years of riding experience behind them, the 15 year old Marcel has gotten this far in only two years of riding. |
PREVIOUS PAGE: Jim Cavanaugh, spastic tomohawk. BELOW: Brian Tunney with some crazy front wheel switching links. Still photos don't do him justice. |
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Masters flatland looked like it was going to be tough to pick a winner — everyone had really good first runs (Masters had two 1 1/2 minute runs). Unfortunately, things fell apart for pretty much everybody in their second runs. Jesse Hicks had a first run full of amazing front wheel links (cross-handed steamroller bar-flipped to steamboat to begin one long string), plus some impressive stick-b/gerator combos; damn shame he couldn't duplicate it in his second run. Rich Upjohn blended old and new school, but too many touches held him back; don't call him a "BMXer", don't do the exact same run twice, but feel free to make fun of his fully-funtioning SpinTech stem. Jim Cavanaugh had a perfect first run that included a fast cross-handed steamroller to spastic tomahawk and rollback whiplashes to gliding junkyard to stick-b; he would've gotten second if it weren't for the latecomers. | |||
| John Wasik, good old fashioned tabletop. |
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| While the Masters class was underway, Brian Tunney and Aaron Behnke pulled up and entered. Aaron took third place with some pretty original (and sometimes bizarre) links in his single 3-minute run. Jared Souney got second place despite not riding like his usual self, but he still hit some rad new front wheel links. But Brian Tunney was the clear winner. The first half of his run was touchless, and he was doing some of the sickest stuff I've seen in quite a while (I knew he was a good rider, but not THAT good). I can't even begin to describe some of the stuff he did — one was a sort of multiple forward Karl kruzers moving around the bars to regular kruzers and back...or something like that; I really wish I had it on video. Nice guys sometimes do finish first. |
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| Newcomer Marcel Trembley, blender-type thing on the pedal. |
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Here's a tip for you if you go to the next Impact contest: bring music. When asked "What do you want to ride to?" too many riders said "It doesn't matter." John Cote then jumps up ("I got it!") and picks something, which is why we heard "Eye of the Tiger", "YMCA", and several cuts from the Grease soundtrack (although Jim did comment "I should ride to that more often" after his perfect run to "Beauty School Dropout"). Of course, Rick MacDonald scared a lot of people by riding to Rorschach... | |||
| Keith McElhinney inverting on the quarterpipe. |
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| I only saw a little bit of Novice Street (a couple guys were almost 360ing off the box jump and into Jimmy), and I missed pretty much all of Expert Street as well — I was too busy riding and hanging out in the parking lot (Headline: "Slacker flatlander does poor job covering contest"), so I apologize to those who ripped it up. If anyone was there and wants to contribute a short writeup of Expert Street, let me know. |
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| Jesse Hicks, steamboat. He flips these directly into halfpackers. |
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There was a pretty long wait between Expert and Masters street, but Masters evenually got underway (although it was later interrupted by an overflowing toilet). Several people questioned the judge's results, who seemed to prefer BMX style over freestyler tricks (which was odd, `cause I think most of the judges were flatlanders). Aaron Behnke had a nice mix of stuff (including good mini ramp work), was pretty technical...and got last place. Keith McElhinney's first run was one of the best I've ever seen him ever do (which included a clean reverse peg grind on the big sub box!) and got second-to-last. But I guess these things happen... | |||
| A bad picture of a good no-footed can-can. Jeff Johnson. |
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| John Wasik tore through his runs almost nonstop — the youngsters just don't get tired. Smooth flowing lines and some rad transfers gave him third...after winning a runoff with Jeff Johnson (who came pretty close to hitting a 360 tailwhip). Second went to Mike Masisco, who pulled a weird-looking backflip (among other stuff). Rich Daugirda won by flowing throughout the park (he should, since he works there...), going real high up the vert wall, and doing a huge crank-bending transfer. |
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| Rich Daugirda going high up the vert wall. |
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Overall I thought this was another good contest, and I even won a shirt for knowing that Woody Itson invented the 540. Who says old-school trivia doesn't pay?
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