24 teams entered edits and im super stoked on everyone one of 'em. At the end of the day the risk is that 23 teams might be bummed. That's inevitably the end result of a contest with one winner. The first round of the Elite 8 was never meant to be a "most likes" contest.
Getting an idea of which teams you guys were stoked on was part of how we selected the top 3 but the ultimate motivation for this contest was to give an opportunity to the crews who normally don't get opportunities. Back in 2006 I hosted the Siver Young Gun open series. The winners of those 4 events made up a team at the Orage Masters that year... they didn't win, didn't even make it out of the first round, but they're careers got a kick start.
Those 4 riders were LJ Strenio, Shea Flynn, Joe Schuster and Matt Walker. And those 4 dudes still slay it on the top level in 2013... and I'm stoked for them. My goal was to give the winner of the Elite 8 the same opportunity that those four dudes had.
That's it that's all, and whichever team get chosen, i'll be just as stoked for them as i was the Young Gun crew back in the day.