Saturday, March 17, 2001 -- Snowshoe, WV
Boardercross Brawl & Halfpipe Invasion (iPO Event Id#: 2381)
Story and photos by Don Parks

[Details] [Coverage] [Boardercross Results] [Half Pipe Results]
[Pic Set 1] [Pic Set 2] [Pic Set 3] [Pic Set 4]

Another sweet prize table
brought to you by
Flow, Balzout, Smith, and Snowshoe

On a day when rain fell across most of the region, it was nothing but snow on top of the mountain at Snowshoe, West Virginia. This did nothing but help the conditions for the annual Boardercross Brawl and Halfpipe Invasion held Saturday.

How did you like the boardercross course? "It was awesome," said 26-over female class winner Karyn Blanco (Ride Snowboards). How about the halfpipe? "Awesome," was the word used by overall men's winner Pat Cumashot (Nitro) to describe the conditions. Talking to the park regulars, it was unanimous that the halfpipe was in great shape. Some thought it may have been the best it had been all year, with an excellent, smooth transition.

But, before venturing into the pipe, it was battle time for the boardercross bad boys (and girls!) Right out of the gates it was a series of three nice hits on relatively small table-tops. This made it interesting as the early air often had boarders three and four-wide.

The airspace was crowded

In the younger classes it was all Hess, as in brother and sister Sam Hess and Sydney Hess from Blowing Rock, North Carolina. New to snowboarding this year, 13-year-old Sydney won the women's 15-under while 12-year-old Sam took the men's 12-under class. When asked about moving up to the 13-15 men's class, Sam commented "I'm going to have to work a lot harder next year."

In some of the other exciting finals it came down to a matter of who could stay standing. In the women's 26-over final the answer was no one. "The three of us crashed on the second hit and I got up and outta there first," is how winner Karyn Blanco saw it. In the men's 16-18 final, Chris Culler, Clayton Wille and Mike Valach tangled and landed in a pile before even reaching the first hit. This left smooth sailing for class winner Adam Cumashot (Ride Snowboards - Balzout). Wille, who got up to finish in third, used the excuse that maybe the winner help direct the other three into chaos. "Well, that's boardercross," replied a smiling Cumashot.

Other class winners included Jamie Justice, Women 19-25, Matt Carey, Men 13-15, Doug Mercer, Men 19-25, and Bill Krahn, Men 26-over.

Bryan Marshall gives the judges a close-up

With the boardercross course cleared, it was now time to set up the judges for the halfpipe competition. However, no sooner than they were seated at the bottom of the pipe, a wicked fog rolled in. So heavy was the mist that you couldn't see from one end of the pipe to the other! The delay didn't last long as the judges just moved themselves to a spot halfway up the top of the right-side wall.

With Adam coming off a boardercross win, his older brother Pat, who only earned third in the 19-25 men's bracket, now had a second chance to show up his little bro. Still recovering from a swollen disk in his back, Pat took full advantage of what he called an "awesome halfpipe".

Not only did his 42.5 score win him the 19-25 age group, it earned him the men's overall victory. His toughest challenger proved to be brother Adam who he only beat out by a single point. But Adam's efforts were plenty good enough to win the Men's 16-18 class. Other men's class winners included Scott Henley (Simms), 13-15, and Chris Gottschalk, 12-under, and Bryan Marshall, 26-Over.

Flyin' in a fog

The women's overall came down to a tie between Karyn Blanco and Kirsten Keller (Airwalk - Full Tilt). Both were racing in the 26-over class and finished with 29.0 total scores. For the under-26 women, it was Christina McDonald bring home the gold.

After all the fun on the slopes, it was time for some indoor celebrating. Snowshoe supplied the party with big time schwag provided by Flow, Balzout and Smith. If you didn't take home some of the goods from this event, then you must not have made the awards ceremony.

Special props go out to the folks that worked hard to deliver another (dare we say it again) awesome event. Thanks Theo Bliagous, Paul Lyttle, Bryan Marshall, Pete Moran, DJ Judd, Alan Dever and anyone else who extended a helping hand.