Friday arrived and some big sessions went down throughout the day, the Russian contingent turned up along with Japanese high flyer, Yusuke Aihara. The heat was getting to everyone, especially us English who were not used to that bright thing in the sky and the 27 degree temperature which accompanied it! Niki had spent the winter season skiing trying to make it to the next winter Olympics to represent Bulgaria in the halfpipe event, his time boosting on the snow was time well spent and now back on his home vert ramp he was looking smooth and confident.

Saturday afternoon and it was time for the prelims, we were fortunate to get a bit of cloud cover which made it somewhat more comfortable. Sam was in the first round and put together some solid runs in what was his first international competition, even linking his backflip to a Fakie Bio 540. Unfortunately It wasn’t enough to get him to the finals, but a great showing for his first comp outside of the UK. Alex and myself were in the second round, I got some nice runs in and progressed in to the finals. Alex showed some technical coping tricks and nice Flatspin and straight spin variations, but unfortunately lacked consistency and went down a few too many times trying to lace a Truespin Ally-oop Fish 450 back in and just missed out on a place in the finals.

The finals were made up of Yusuke Aihara, Niki Najdenov, Kiro Trayanov, Pavel Mitrenga and myself. They ran as an ordered jam session and the winner would be decided on the overall impression they make throughout the jam. Kiro was spinning every which way and nailed Flatspin 900s over the channel gap, Pavel soared high with signature Flatspin 540s and Mctwist 900s. Japanese rider Yusuke was amazing the crowd with huge airs and big Rocket 540s, enough to earn him the third place position. I mixed it up well throwing as many tricks as I could in to my runs, also I was happy to get a new trick of mine into one of my runs, a tweaked Stale grab 720, though I didn’t land it as clean as I wanted, but finished up with the silver medal. First place was claimed by Niki, flying high and looking smooth and at home in the air… congratulations to him and also good luck making it to the Winter Olympics!

Thanks to all of the Bulgarians for hosting the event and for their hospitality… I look forward to returning soon!

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WARNING! DON’T BITE OFF MORE THAN YOU CAN CHEW!

Thankfully with a course of deep tissue massage and ultra sound I should be back on my skates in no time!I’m just grateful that this niggle showed itself now so that I have time to sort it before this years contests get underway.

I love the individuality of my sport and the creativity it allows you. If you look at five trampolinists all performing the same trick, they look very similar. In contrast, if you did the same with skaters you would get five completely different versions of the same trick… the axes, speed and point of rotation would vary greatly as would the grab. Maybe the trampolinists are this way as they have coaches who teach specifically how to do each trick, every rotation can be broken down and built up to in smaller stages. I often wonder what inline vert skating would be like if our sport had followed a similar path of coaches and set techniques. It wouldn’t be the sport that love so much, however, I do think that we would benefit from some coaching at least at the early stages of tricks to get the ground work done and the basic rotation in place before adding our own unique artistic flair.

Although it’s a different style to my sport, when I see someone on a trampoline going as high as they do whilst doing a double backflip with triple twist, I can’t help but think that there is certainly a lot more that I can learn from their sport!

You can get your claws on a packet of Xtreme Tutti Fruitti Chewits on this weeks issue of the Simpsons Comic! WOO HOO!
Mmmm…Xtreme Chewits!

Grab them while you can!KEEP CHEWING!

The Russian skaters always bring some amazing tricks, so I’m looking forward to joining them on the ramp in the Olympic stadium on Saturday the 2nd and showing the public what inline vert is all about!

I began my off ramp training early in 2008 when I was in Australia, staying with Tasmanian inline vert legend, Shane Yost. At the time, Shane was ranked number two in the world and trained as hard off the ramp as he did on it, this opened my eyes to the direction that I needed to head in. I learned all I could from him and continued to learn when I returned home, I also took a course and qualified as a level 3 personal trainer to help give myself a better understanding of my training. My gym work helps me to develop explosive power in order to get higher on the ramp, better endurance to enable me to perform competition runs without failing through fatigue, higher resistance to injury through flexibility work and also shorter recovery time when I do get hurt.

So remember, there are no short cuts to places worth going!

WARNING! FOR XTREME CHEWERS ONLY!

Pro’s like Rich Parker only use certified equipment. This video is a xtremely helpful to raise awareness of XTREME sports and the impact it can have when not wearing certified equipment – always wear certified protective gear chewers.

ARF Presents: Certified vs Non-Certified Bicycle Helmet Impact Test from Athlete Recovery Fund on Vimeo.

WARNING! DON’T BITE OFF MORE THAN YOU CAN CHEW.