Snolf Review & Photos
Review by Mike Austin, creator of Snolf. See the gallery here
Despite the ironic snow falls which had restricted many Snolfers from travelling to the SnowDome, a strong line up of locals and brave travellers signed in for Snolf. The scoreboard was up and ready to go, prizes bagged up ready for the winners, the Endeavor tent on slope ready to go, and then we met our first snag. The first winter snowfall had immobilised the nights DJ who also had the microphone we needed for the on-slope communication. This didn’t hold us back though, to spread the nights word I resorted to announcing to the riders individually from the bottom of the rope tow lift. Thanks to the patience of the riders and commoradery through linking the chain of instruction we were underway into Snolf 2010.
The jam session rolled on and with a relaxed atmosphere everyone seemed to be having good fun and throwing down tricks way in advance of what was needed to qualify. Nevertheless we had to pick out the top 9 riders who were to lead the Snolfers out and lay down the all important 9 Snolf tricks. Myself with help from the nights videographer Jamie Durham, and the nights photographer Mark Harris. We picked out the top 9 stand out line up of (in no particular order) Dan Oughton, Luke Lightwood, George Wooley, Ollie Waters, Jake , Ollie Dutton, Calum Paton, Ben Izzard, & Ronnie Organ.
So the 9 tricks picked individually by the top 9 snolfers for all the riders to try one by one were, Hard way FS 180 to SW BS 180 off, SW BS 50-50 to SW BS 360 off, Front Blunt 450 off, BS 180 on to Boardslide to 270 off, cab 270 on to fakie, hard way back 180 on cab 3 off, SW BS blunt 270 out, FS 180 to cab 360 off, BS 180 on SW BS 180 off.
The first rider down is the one who picked the current trick, shortly followed by all other riders attempting to stomp it also and bag themselves a PAR (score 0). If a trick isn’t landed they score +1 thus raising their score average, the key to winning being the lowest average score gained by landing the most tricks.
During the comp communications were helped via a mobile snowboard message courier provided by the over-qualified service of 9 times British Masters Champion Joel Erith, also inventor of Chuckbuddies and one of Snolf sponsors. To my side I had the aid of Paul Coley, a past experinced Snolfer who helped with the scoreboard and some technical judging.
The live scoreboard was frantically updated after each trick was completed by all the Snolfers, keeping a visual update on the current ranking list. From start to finish we saw riders names rise and fall and rise again making it anyones game to take the title. Once the first 5 tricks had been run the stakes were pushed higher as the harder tricks were put on the board. This now meant that landing a trick would score a -1 (birdie), forming a larger gap from the penalty score of +1 (bogey). The score then pushing their average up or down to determin the rise or fall on the leaderboard. (are you still with me?) Further to this the rider who called the current trick had even more at stake as they would score -2 for a landing or +2 penalty.
Confusing I know, luckilly I had mathmatical help from Jake Overton who was at hand to be my Carol Vorderman of the scoreboard.
So the riders all showed real enthousiasm, skill and determination giving Snolf 2010 a strong vibe and high level of technicality, a big thanks to all of you. Holding a place on the Snolf scoreboard were Richard Organ in 10th, Dan Oughton in 9th, Ronnie Organ in 8th & Jack Oughton in 7th. Ben Izzard despite recovering from a serious knee injury a year ago pulled up at 6 place bagging a prize bag including a Demon helmet, Ignite beanie & ThrityTwo hoody. A similar prize bag awarded to George Wooley finishing 5th, Ollie Dutton 4th, all the top 4 Prizes all inlcuded fantastic prizes from ThirtyTwo, AirHole face mask, Chuckbuddies, Ignite beanies and Drop eyewear.
In 3rd place taking home a very special Snolf bronze trophy was SnowDome local Luke Lightwood and taking the silver trophy in 2nd place was Ollie Waters. Then to be crowned 2010 Snolf Champion with an impressive final score of -2 (double birdie) was Calum Paton. Calum took home a bag of prizes which included one of only 12 limited edition ThirtyTwo Snowboards! Kindly donated on behalf of ThirtyTwo by team manager Dale Taylor.
A huge thanks to the SnowDome and all those who helped on the night, including all the Riders involved, Endeavor, ThirtyTwo, Air Hole, Ignite beanies, Drop Gloves/goggles & CHUCKBUDDiES.
‘nice chilled comp, rather than everyone going wild, nice change’. Ollie Dutton
‘Sick session n loadsa fun..Cheers Mike!’ Ben Izzard
‘thanks again mike, the event was real good fun! :)’ Calum Paton
