I recently had the pleasure of hosting Down Rails & Doublekinks at Sugarbush Parks in Vermont. This was the 5th and certainly the best rendition of the occasion so far. There was a line at registration for nearly the full two hours it was open. So many people came out to enjoy the day that we ran out of waivers. All told, there were about 150 skiers who joined the fun.

Once I figured out how to manage the crowd of entrant things got wild quick. Because of the huge turn out for the open men's category I had to split up the jam into different sessions. In the first hour, the open women's category rotated through the set up with 15 minutes on each feature. The 16 & under category was also skiing during this first hour working through an opposite rotation of the set up.

After they had their go at the set up, the open men's was unleashed. With over 80 people in this category it was certainly a bit chaotic. I split up 4 cohorts of about 20 people and rotated them thru the features with 15min on each one. There was a constant stream of heavy tricks being landed. Well known heavy hitters from all across New England showed up. Names like Bobby Sullivan, Andy Hoblitzelle, Chase Mohrman, Young Snow, Mike and Chris Dejohn, Brandon Westburg came out swinging.

When the dust settled and the landings had turned to sheets of ice the judges were left with a the hard task of deciding podiums. I'm so glad that I'm just the loud guy hosting the event and have nothing to do with deciding who wins. That being said, based on the reactions when I announced the top 3 I would say the judges got it exactly right. Maybe the Olympics should use this same crew next time around.

16 & Under

Third: Gavin Chalky

Second: Ty Szigeti

First: Durham Jones

Women's Open

Third: Maddie Conklin

Second: Taylor Zucco

First: Drew Hooker

Men's Open

Third: Eliot Deleo

Second: Max Suidak

First: Chase Mohrman

WTRP Award: Chris DeJohn

Full Recap Video:

https://www.newschoolers.com/videos/watch/1035072/Embed-Code