Features

2007 Roxy Chicken Jam

by Roberta Rodger

For the complete and larger set of photos, check out the gallery here.

This year’s North American Roxy Chicken was held in March instead of December and proved to be a good move. The Roxy Chicken Jam is known as the premier women’s event with progressive riding and a fun atmosphere. With clear sunny days, warm weather, a good park setup and the addition of a pipe event, you couldn’t ask for anything more to have an enjoyable weekend. I cruised up to Park City and stayed with the Volcom crew—team manager Bonnie Kuntz and riders Cheryl Mass and Bryn Valaika and DC super skater Lyn-z Adams Hawkins.

Thursday saw slopestyle qualifiers in the morning and pipe qualifiers in the afternoon. The slope course started off with a three-jump rhythm section into your choice of either a flat-down-flat box rail or A-frame box, then either a 20-foot box or wall jib to the Showtime booter. From there you had an option of a flat-down-flat round bar or a down-rail. I spent most of the qualifier doing laps through the park with Raewyn Reid, SBC contributor Sara Tollestrup, and Bev Vuilleumier. Once the slope qualifiers started I headed over to the pipe with Mercedes for a couple laps. It was my first time dropping into a 22-foot pipe, pretty scary but fun. With all the sun and warmth the pipe was definitely a little slushy for the qualifiers but the girls made it work.

On Friday Sara and I got up early to watch the Superpipe main event and finals. Canadian team members Mercedes Nicoll, Dom Vallee, and Sarah Conrad made it out for a quick stop to Park City on route to the Canadian Nationals. The level of riding was high with the likes of Gretchen Bleiler, Torah Bright, Kjersti Bruass, and Cheryl Mass in attendance. I have to say I was really impressed with the level of pipe riding at this event. There were more than a few girls doing Crippler 7s, and Mctwists, and back-to-back 5s were pretty much stock. You definitely had to be pushing the limit to get into the finals. The only Canadian to make it was Sarah Conrad, who had a very technical run including styled out Air-to-Fakies, a Cab 540, switch Alley Oop 5, Backside 360 Melon and a Switch Method. Unfortunately, neither Dom nor Mercedes made it into the finals but that didn’t stop them from poaching runs during the jam final.

The finals were a mix of girls from all over the world. The announcer seemed really keen on someone getting back-to-back Sevens in the finals because, according to him, it had never been done in a women’s halfpipe event. I guess Nicola Thost’s back-to-back sevens in the ‘98 Olympics didn’t count or Elena Hights in the 2006 Olympics—either way he wasn’t stoked when I tried to correct him.

There were a lot of technical runs going down; we all know that Torah Bright has the most tech runs in women’s halfpipe and aside from her huge Cab Sevens and Switch Backside 540s, she also threw in some switch Alley Oops. Gretchen had been riding strong in the qualifiers with her signature Cripplers and Frontside Sevens, but unfortunately took a hard fall in the finals and tweaked her knee. Cheryl Mass was the only girl to drop into the pipe switch and the only girl to ever land a Haakon Flip, then ending her run with a big Alley Oop McTwist. Paulina Ligocka was going for her first ever Frontside 9 in the pipe and landed it on her last run. She was so pumped she even went for a Haakon on the last hit but scrubbed out. In the end, Manuela Pesko’s “first ever back-to-back sevens by a girl at a contest over the lip” (I swear Nicola Thost never did anything under the lip!) landed her in first with Torah in second and Paulina in third.

Saturday was another fun sunny day for the slopestyle main event and all the girls were excited to ride the course. Leanne Pelosi and Raewyn Reid were the only Canadians in the event. Raewyn was looking strong with frontside 5s on the first jump to Switch Backside 180s on the second. But she was having problems with the speed for the third jump so unfortunately didn’t make it into the finals. All the usual girls were in the finals, Erin Comstock, Hana Beamon, Cheryl Mass, Torah Bright, Jenny Jones, etc. The jumps weren’t very big but they gave the girls a chance to really push their riding and not just fall into stock contest runs.

Cab 540s were thrown down by a variety of girls including Chanelle Sladick and Jamie Anderson. A few Sevens were stomped in every direction by girls like Silvia Mittermuller and Cheryl Mass who both went for 900s as well. Erin Comstock and Hana Beamon were getting technical with switch tricks but neither could link together a flawless run. Torah Bright was looking solid all day with Backside 5s, Switch 180s, Frontside 360s, smooth rails and a Cab 720, landing her third on the podium. Jamie Anderson, who has been a major contender on the slopestyle scene all year, was looking strong with Cab 5s, Frontside 360s, and technical moves on the rails including a Boadslide to 270 out on the kinked rail. She took home second place as well as Best Trick on the kinked rail. With a season of top threes being taken by the under 20 crew, it was great to see Tara Dakides take home a much-deserved first place after a flawless Frontside 360, to Backside 360, Back Flip, smooth steez on the rails, to a Backside Rodeo on the Showtime booter finishing with a solid board slide through the kinked rail. Tara was stoked to once again be on top of the podium. Another Best Trick went out to Leanne Pelosi for her 270 on the down rail. Roxy’s own Torah Bright was announced as the TTR World Champion. Torah was doused in champagne from all directions and she could barely get over to Cheryl who handed her the crown. Torah was all smiles as she held her new puppy over her head and rejoiced in the awesome year she’s had. It was great to see such a talented young woman, who truly is an inspiration to young girls everywhere, graciously accept her award. Yeah, Torah!