Nike ACG Team Blog : News from the snowbard team

El Tarter. On the 26th of March i made my way to Andorra for the 4 Star TTR Contest Grandvalira Total Fight. It was the second time I have been there. We (Louis Purucker, Michi “Stani” Stanschitz) arrived with the shuttle on Thursday afternoon in El Tarter (Andorra) while a snowstorm was hitting the Area. Just right for a afternoon wellness session. Unfortunately it got already warm again in the evening and it started to rain up the mountain. There went our Pyrenees powder turns.

On Friday it was Bluebird again and temperatures were climbing rapidly to 17°C at the park. Friday was qualifying day and so I could just go get some slush powder lines and ride the park during training. There were 2 different lines to go:
-    Pipe ->  Gap Kicker (18m) ->  Step up Butter Box Step Down
-    Big Kicker (20m)  ->  Gap Step up Transfer (MotoX Jump)  -> Step up Butter Box Step Down
So we had a fun day riding and got ready for the final day on Saturday.

On Saturday about 50 riders were competing for 16 Spots in the K.O. System. We had two runs and the better one counted. I did cab 9 on the big kicker, Bs Air over the Step Up Gap and Fs 180 to Sw Bs 540 at the butter box. I qualified first for the K.O. System. First round and quarter finals we had just one run each. The guy with the higher points decided who goes first.
I won my battle in the first round. Quarter finals were next which I had to go against Jaakko Ruha. I had more points from the first round so I let Jaakko go first. That moment I was thinking about doing a cab 9. Then Jaakko dropped in and did a BS 10 to Backflip and to Fs 360 down the butter box. Damn, nice run. I was standing up there and had to change my run in seconds if I want to beat this. So I dropped in normal and went for a Fs 10 Mute which I stomped perfectly before I did a Backflip over the Step-up Gap Jump and a Fs 180 to Sw Bs 540 on the butter box! I guess my trick on the butter box made it clear and so I kicked the first finish rider out!

But what a surprise, there was the next finish kid waiting in the semifinal. Now we had two runs and the better one counts. I was dropping first with a Cab 9 on the Big Kicker. Ville Paumola went straight for the Fs 10 but he slide the last 90° and couldn’t land it clear. 2nd run Ville went for the Fs 10 again but from up there I didn’t see the landing. So I went also for the Fs 10 in the second run and stomped it perfect like the backflip and the Sw 540. Turned out that Ville just did a Fs 9. Sick, I just kicked out the second finish guy.

And guess what, there was another Finish guy waiting for me in the Final. Ville Uotila made it also to the Final. 2 runs each again. I went first and I really wanted to take the title so I went for risk. I did already two Fs 10’s and stomped 100% so I thought I go for it again and out of two runs I’m going to stick one and the rest of my run. But I couldn’t land the first one and Ville did a nice Sw Bs 9 to Fs 7 to Sw Bs 540. So I had one more run to beat that and my point was that I cant kill that Sw Bs 9 with a Cab 9. So I went for risk and Fs 10 again. Unfortunately I also couldn’t land my second either. I went to big and I guess the 12 would have been easier to land as the 10. So I guess my Tactic for the final was not the best, but you loose and you learn! And a 2nd place on a really high leveled 4 Star Contest is amazing and I’m really stoked!!!

The party was on! There was Motocross action in the evening and a big tent where the party was going off till 1am. Then everyone moved to “Nemo”, the bar that is managed by Merlin Balfour. I know Merlin since the SPC Times in Mayrhofen and from me a big THÄNKS to Merlin for the amazing hospitality all weekend.

In the TTR Ranking I caught up 4 places to 31st position. I got one more chance to climb the Top 30. In two weeks the Snickers Classic in Saas Fee is going down, which is the last 4 Star contest of the season.

So I’m looking forward to some nice spring sessions!
Greets from the Chillertal
Rudi

Found a nice Review Clip of the Ästhetiker Wängl Tängl Jäm 2008 on Metho.TV:

http://stream.method.tv/?ch=00034&id=878

Have fun watchin

Rudi 

I skied well in Tignes, ended up 6th even though I had some crashes in the run, so the rest was great :-)

It means Im in for Verbier Xtremes, it will be held on saturday. It also means Im guaranteed a spot for the world tour next year, if I want..

Cheers S

Too bad it’s over! It was an amazing week!
This years Wängl Tängl got into new dimensions with one week of snowboarding, skating, art and parties!
Unfortunately we did have bad weather the first 4 days, so we didn’t get the training days we planned.
We had 2 Qualification days. On Thursday we had Kicker Line qualification and on Friday the Alternative Line qualification. Both points got added and the best 24 Riders advanced to the Final day on Saturday. It was such a high level at the qualification so I was really stoked to advance to the Final day.

Too bad we were not lucky enough to have bluebird on Saturday. Instead we had clouds, hard landings and bad sight. But we pulled the Final through anyway. So we started up with the Kicker line. I had a really nice run with Cab 9, Bs 7 and Fs 7 Tail which I stomped far down near to the K-Point of the landing.
After that everyone had one run on the Alternative Line which I stomped all including Cab 180 to 50-50 to Bs 180 off on the Surfboard rail on the Suzuki, double handed Nosegrab and Fs Alley Oop on the Quarters, backflip over the little Jump and a Bs Air over the right corner. I didn’t slam once in my runs so I was pretty stoked.

Because of the weather we decided in a Riders Meeting that we don’t do any more runs. No more Kicker runs because it was concerned to dangerous and no more Alternative runs because it would have been unfair to get a better Alternative run but no change for the other riders to get a better Kicker run.

Those two runs together made the Final result of the Wängl Tängl 2008 which put me in the 5th place in a contest with one of the highest International Level of the TTR Contests.
I’m really stoked about that result and it also pushes me in the TTR World Ranking:

Out of the TTR press release:
“Rudi Kroell (AUT), who finished 5th at the Wängl Tängl, took a huge leap in the TTR rankings, moving into the Swatch TTR Top 25.”

So the Wängl Tängl pushes me into place 24 of the TTR World Ranking, which makes me not only the best Austrian but also the best ACG Rider for the moment!

Eeeeöööööhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

Greets from the Chillertal
Rudi


Links:

Ästhetiker -http://www.aesthetiker.com/tour/2008/snowboard.php

Hot-Zone.TV - http://www.hot-zone.tv/content/12.0.html?&tx_ttnews[tt_news]=867&tx_ttnews[backPid]=4&cHash=5ce0f31e96

TTR - http://www.ttrworldtour.com/news/news-detail/article/andreas-gidlund-takes-it-all-home-at-5-star-aesthetiker-jam-waengl-taengl.html

TTR Wängl Clip - http://stream.ttrworldtour.com/mov.php?mid=146&aid=146&cat=00001&br=256

Some breaking news from the weekends contest in the States, sophie rodriguez took 5th place in the world superpipe championships, her first major contest in the states this year. It was a world class field which was riding so congratulations and hopefully she can keep up the momentun for the upcoming events, the US Open and world junior champs.

Gary took 13th place in the mens contest and is looking to break into the top 10 for the US Open.

Air & Style

Bergisel, Innsbruck
02.02.2008

This year the Air & Style came back home to Innsbruck with a Quaterpipe Contest. 2 weeks before the contest i got a call if i want to be a Backup rider for the contest. I had to think about that because i didn’t ride Quaterpipe for more then 3 years. But how could i say no to be part of the home coming from Air & Style!
So i confirmed and on wednesday before the contest they finally told me that i just made it to the main contest. So the pressure was on.

We didn’t really had that much training that we supposed to have because the weather was really warm and they were afraid that the Quaterpipe gets fucked. So i had to go for the Contest with not a lot of training.

To stand up there at the start gate was amazing!! 12.000 people were going crazy in the arena while i was droppin in and hit the quarterpipe with 90 km/h. I was pretty high on the second run and because i did pop a little bit to less i landed on the couping after a 6m Backside Air. So i bruised my right knee. I still did the third run but didn’t really feel it after that slam. I got just 21th but i was really stoked to be part of the Air & Style. It was an amazing expirience with an incredible crowd and „Queens of the Stone Age“ as LiveAct! Siicckkk!!

I had to take 2 weeks off riding to get my knee better again. I went riding after 10 days at the Penken Park and did some jumps while i had a little short landing on a BS 720, i felt the bruise in my knee again.
Anyway i went fort he Check the Ripper on the Seegrube.
 

Also check:

- http://fm4.orf.at/michael/221625                                                 FM4 Report

- http://www.tirol.com/sport/sportmix/innsbruck/76297/index.do            Tirol.com

Check the Ripper

www.nordparksessions.com 

Seegrube, Innsbruck
23.02.2008

Last weekend the Nordpark Sessions took place again on Seegrube in Innsbruck. A Photo Session on Thursday, a night pipe Session on Friday and the Legendary Check the Ripper contest on Saturday. It’s all about finding the best allround shredder.
The setup is a run which includes a kicker, a lot of banks, little bumps and a about 250 meter long and steep freeride slope with about 8 gates for the directions.

The whole thing runs on time. At the kicker you can get up to 12 seconds off your time depending on what trick you do. On my first run i did cab 900 and my time was 01:42:56. That seemed allready pretty good. But i wanted to be faster on my second try. So i did cab 900 again to get a lot of time off. I had a pretty good run. My second run was 4 seconds faster with 01:38:88! I was really stoked espacially because a german tourist crossed my way and i had to scream at him and shred around him.
There was another guy who also did cab 900 on the kicker but he didn’t know his time because someone else crossed the goal line. He said that he didn’t feel to good on his second run. So i thought it could be possible to take the title of the Ripper. I was really stoked and also a lot of other guys said that i won that shit!

So we went to the price giving at 9 pm in the Jimmy’s in Innsbruck. It was unbelieveable. but the other guy really kicked my ass by 0,13 seconds!!!! I couldn’t believe it. So i got 2nd again like i have been last year already! DAMN! Seems like thats life.

And it also seems like i have to go there again next year to try to finally get the Title „The Ripper“!
 

Greets from the Chillertal

Rudi

P.s.: WÄNGL TÄNGL is coming up! Check www.aesthetiker.com 

I made in onto the podium!

That was my goal for this competition because I was so close at my last comp in Korea. And I came 2^nd!

I had some difficulty with the snow changing in qualifying so just scraped through in 13^th position. This meant I had to fight in every heat to get in from the worst start gate.

In my first heat, I was in 4^th going into the first turn, I passed into 3rd going around the 2^nd turn and then into 2nd further down the course, I kept that position the rest of the way down. One girl tried a move to pass me just before the finish but she didn’t manage it.

The second heat was another interesting one, I was in 4^th into the first turn again, the girl in front of me messed up on one of the jumps so I passed her in the following turn which put me in 3^rd. I did the same move just before the finish that the girl had tried to do to me in my last heat but I succeeded where she hadn’t and I got into 2^nd which qualified me for the final!

I got into 3^rd going into the first turn. I had to keep the girl I had passed behind me while trying to catch the 2 in front of me. I passed Lyndsey Jacobellis (Olympic silver medallist) half way down and I held second place the remainder of the course, I got close to the leader (Maelle Ricker) at the end but not quite close enough to pass.

So I got silver! It’s the first time I have been on the podium for a good while and it feels great!

I am off to Lake Placid tomorrow for the next world cup. I have just finished packing.

Only one place further up to go!

Zoe  

P.S. My current world ranking is 4^th.

Roy has got another good international result under his belt with a 2nd place finish in the Engadin Snow. He stomped a switch 7 double tail grab followed by a 180 on 180 off on teh wall ride so congrats to him.

Ulrik is competing this week in the Arctic Challenge after riding in the Arctic Open last week. His riding was so consistent and with a lot of potential to blow up that Terje thought he would be a great addition to TAC. Lets hope he starts throwing down, there was even talk of a double flip, more news to come.

G

Congratulations to Zoe Gillings - she's just proved why she's the UK's number one Snowboardcross athlete by producing her best result of the season.  She finished in 4th place at the FIS World Cup Snowboardcross competition in Sungwoo, Korea. Zoe qualified into the finals in ninth position, and won her first heat convincingly leaving World Number one, Lyndsay Jacobellis trailing behind. The line up in the second heat was particularly tough as it included three of the Worlds top racers, each with World Cup victories under their belts. An extremely focused Zoe didn’t let this faze her and produced yet another great result finishing second and securing her place in the final. In the final it was a head-to-head dual down the technical and demanding course with each rider battling hard for position. Unfortunately being placed in the slowest of the narrow lanes, Zoe was unable to overtake and finished in 4th place, narrowly missing out on a podium position. This is Zoe’s best result in three and a half years and she has now competed in two finals in the past four weeks. Zoe commented after the race, “Its great to be back reaching the finals again, a World cup win is firmly in my sights.”

Results
1st – Maelle Ricker (CAN)
2nd – Lindsey Jacobellis (USA)
3rd – Mellie Francon (SUI)
4th – Zoe Gillings, (UK)

Well done Zoe :)