The AGC Indoor Quarterpipe Contest
By Brooke Geery
 It only takes $32,000 to have Terje show up at your event. Please take note. |
Combine a pile of mushy man made snow, the Stimilon crew to shape it into a rideable mass, Eminem, Macho Man Randy Savage, twenty or so snowboarders, and thousands of spectators, many of whom had never seen snow and you have it: The first indoor snowboard contest in the US. The event took place at the Great Western Forum in Inglewood, CA, part of the great mass of freeways and buildings that is Los Angeles.
Unlike most ski towns, Inglewood has a large African American population, gas stations with prison bars over the windows, and cars with hydraulics and bass abound, so it made for quite a different experience than your usual contest. The event had quite the invite list, including heavy hitters from as far away as Norway and Nova Scotia, some of whom seemed quite excited to finally fit in. One of these was the most bitter competitor of the evening, Trevor Andrew, whose do-rag was almost played out in this crowd.
 What do you mean Trevor Andrew didn't win for his Mctwist. Oh well, he still won me freee booze. E mail me and I'll explain. |
The quarterpipe, 20 feet tall, took a little longer to build than anticipated, so practice, originally slated for 4:00, was pushed back to 6:00. In the meantime, the event’s official dot com sponsor got in trouble for tailgating in the parking lot, while competitors readied their equipment. When things finally got rolling, practice went by quickly, as did qualifiers, and soon the field was narrowed to eight riders.
Being hit constantly for about an hour had taken a toll on the
quarterpipe, and there was some concern expressed by the competitors that for the amount
of money on the line ($32,000 and a Mitsubishi Montero) it was up to snuff to fairly
decide a winner. There was talk of an even split between the eight of them, but after it
was made clear that no matter how the money was paid out top three would still be named,
it was decided that things would go as originally planned: Two runs, best score takes it.
While all this was going on, some of the riders who didn’t make the cut helped to fix
the QP, with the end result being pretty good.
 Romain Demarchi was bitter because the stupid Americans kept changing their mind on how to divide up the money. |
There were basically two types of tricks pulled in the finals, super
technical, and huge. Trevor Andrew was the first to pull a mctwist, which was exciting to
anyone who had taken part in Crossrocket’s Snowboard Bookie, and Mike Michaelchuk
stepped it up with a huge, clean Michaelchuk on his first. Terje dropped in, and amazed
the crowd with a one-foot Mctwist. Romian Demarchi was riding well, as was Rippey.
The contest was basically won during the first run: Michaelchuk had taken it. Knowing this, he stepped up to the double backflip second run, which was definitely a crowd pleaser. Terje simply went huge, and took second with his one-footer. Trevor, on the other hand took two tries to stomp his signature trick, but his second run was enough for third. After the
and the winner is..Mike Michaelchuk. |
contest was over, Keir Dillon dropped in for one more hit and finally pulled off a perfect Mctwist.
Terje finished off the contest by pissing on the quarterpipe in front of the full stadium, while Michaelchuk was handed the keys to a car that he probably doesn’t need. For the grande finale, Eminem came out on stage and made fun of Britney and Christina. Then everyone headed to the open bar, which was definitely the highlight of the event.
Please note: I wrote this story for Bluetorch, but they obviously aren't going to use it, so here it is. What this means is I toned down the sarcasm and negativity. Yes, it is possible. Check out Crossrocket for results, I don't feel like retyping them right now.
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