2021 Winter Dew Tour lookback Day 4

Learning to snowboard took a lot out of me so I stayed in during the morning to watch the Women’s Snowboard Slopestyle finals from my computer. I have to give Annika Morgan props because she came up short on a jump and instead of bailing, she threw herself into a front flip. I brought it up at the Roxy signing after the contest, and she shrugged it off (but was obviously very grateful to have not wiped out). Get the woman into Knuckle Huck!

I rode the Woodward Express to the top of the slopestyle course just as the Men were starting their competition. It turned out that pedestrians got to ride for free. I wish I had known earlier because maybe I would have tried to go up multiple times. It’s still a long and strenuous trek (TV makes the course look deceptively small). Some of the people I passed had the stream on their phones, which is a good way to keep track of results if you have the battery power and data plan. I did enjoy snapping photos of the riders at various parts of the course though.

Since qualifiers were cancelled, the Men’s Snowboard Slopestyle finals included the entire field of 25 with 2 runs each. The loss of a run plus Dew Tour being part of Olympics qualification put pressure on some of the athletes, but Team U.S.A. thrived. Sean FitzSimons popped up on my radar, finishing just outside the podium. Chris put together the run of his life to knock the ever-immaculate Mark McMorris off the top spot.

Being somewhat of a hometown boy, residing close to Silverthorne, Chris was cheered on by many in the corral.

Then Red Gerard took the lead from him after pulling a 1620 and was subsequently mobbed by friends. Both guys were incredibly stoked for each other, and their partners and friends joined them in celebrating.

I really loved being able to mingle with athletes and their support crew. I learned that Stale Sandbech might be bringing back StaleLIFE in some manner and got to meet fellow Asian riders, Nirvana Ortanez and Hailey Langland. Rene Rinnekangas said he decided to not compete in Streetstyle so you can bet I was surprised to see his name get called in the competition later that night.

Hailey and me

Streetstyle was in the evening so I had some time to browse the Dew Tour Village before Streetstyle and just in tim for the Mountain Dew athlete signings. Red, Danny Davis, and Julia Marino were there so the village was more crowded than usual. As a result, I didn’t do as many things to get free swag. However, I swung by the Save a Brain booth again. Mary Walsh had introduced me to the founder, Kelsey Boyer, after learning that I do TBI research, and I was stoked that I was able to almost come full circle since Kevin Pearce’s story is what led me to pursue the subject.

Since I knew I wasn’t going to last the evening, I wound up watching Women’s Ski Streetstyle on the computer. It was rad seeing Eileen Gu and Kelly Sildaru do something different from their usual comp events. I made sure to get out for Women’s Snowboard Streetstyle to cheer on Alexis Hernandez-Roland and Ari Morrone, whom I met the other day. Lex’s rail game was on fire, and they took home both first prize and Best Trick.

Lex won with a Cab 270 boardslide to sameway 270 (I had to look that up on the Dew Tour website).

The snowboarders looked like they were having so much fun, and a highlight was Ellie Weiler sliding over Alexis’ board. In contrast, Men’s Ski Streestyle felt very serious. I’m sure they enjoyed themselves, but there was an intensity just in the way they marched up the hill. Once the contest started for them, they were able to loosen up and play. Max Moffat and Alex Hall got the most cheers with the latter taking the win while the former getting Best Trick. Finally, Men’s Snowboard Streetstyle was a frenzy of sick tricks from heavy hitters like Sebastian Toutant, Zeb Powell, and Dylan Alito. Zeb and Rene were so creative, playing around with off-course obstacles.

Rene found a new place to drop in.

However, Luke Winkelmann was feeling the birthday love, and he got home the best present of first place (Sebastien got Best Trick). He was turning 21 so I can only imagine what the celebrations were like. For the rest of us, we were treated with fireworks to end a jam-packed day of Dew Tour.

Click here for more photos from the Dew Tour and here for other pics from Copper. For past entries: Day 2 and Day 3.