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We’ll take you through qualifying starting with the riders who did not make it.

SE’s Fernando Sabat had some problems with the last set. He had not jumped it in practice but tried to clear the distance in his qualifying runs. He went for it but ended up on the wrong side of the jump and called it a day. Elevation has been pushing the level of dirt jumping with multiple berms, transfer possibilities and big hits on a slope style course (down hill). To be able to make it to the finals you at least have to clear everything.

In 27th we had Rob Darden, who simply did not have his day. His runs down the mountain ended up on top where he threw in enough tricks but couldn’t keep it going.

Biz Jordan froze up during his runs too. He had been waiting to ride the Elevation comp for a few years but once there Biz had a hard time keeping things smooth. You need to land everything well to be able to clear the next set. Biz had some problems doing that and said: FFFUUUUUUUCCCCCCKKKKK!!! a few times before pulling off the course.

It wasn’t Brad Bonar’s day. The Canadian showed great skills in practice and was one of the few riders who actually transferred between the several lines up top. A face-first crash in practice had his face bleeding but since he’s Canadian he made it back on top of the roll-in for qualifying. Brad pulled great turndown flips in practice but needed a few too many attempts in the contest to make it through. He ended up on place 25 which was 13 spots away from making the finals.

Alex Dropsy had put on a brake on his bike for the occasion. Smart choice. Dropsy is not afraid of big sets and 360-d his way down to the village where he simply skied the last set. Dropsy has great style and many skills but showed a few too little tricks in this field to place higher. Alex took his new Nikon camera and started shooting pics of the rest of the riders.

Matt Beyers from Canada scored a 59.5 and had few good runs, but also a few scratches. With three runs out of four counting, it doesn’t help to have 2 bad runs. Matt made it down to the valley most of the time where he was greated by Jay Miron who was doing live interviews with all of the riders who were coming down. They could watch each riders’ run on the big screen in replay which was great for the riders and also for the Whistler crowd. Things were set up right at Elevation and the sun kept on shining. The Red Lobster was almost in the house again.

Germany’s Markus Hampl made it to Canada with his custom painted machine. Markus builds a lot of the contests jumps in Europe and has pulled out of contests before because of lack of creativity that the jumps offered. There was reason to pull out in Whistler for that reason until his front wheel blew up in his last run. Traveling overseas, adjusting to the time change, dealing with jetlag in an unknown environment, getting little practice in on a demanding course, it all affected Markus in a way but you won’t hear him complain about it. He was stoked to be present.

BiBi rode really well but also had a few sailers on the last set and even jumped off once on the big 40 footer. The wind didn’t help much on the last set and Bibi pressed the eject button before hanging up with his back wheel which would have been worse. Jay gave him compliments regardless and asked BiBi what was going on: “Sometimes you are lucky, sometimes you are not lucky,” was Bibi’s reply.

Leo Forte was stoked he made it to Elevation together with his brother Kye. Leo styled his way through the bigger line on the upper section to blast double lookbacks in the village. On the microphone he was calling out his brother to the likings of Jay who kept the brother rivalry going. Leo flowed his way to place 20, missing the finals by 8 spots.

BdJ

Place 20-28 Elevation 2007 qualifying results:
20. Leo Forte 70.3
21. Romauld “Bibi” Noirot 68.3
22. Markus Hampl 63.9
23. Matt Beyers 59.5
24. Alex Dropsy 56.2
25. Brad Bonar 47.3
26. Ryan “Biz” Jordan 46.9
27. Rob Darden 43.6
28. Fernando Sabat 40.3