National BMX Freestyle championships Iceland. By BdJ

Aug 14, 2017

Written by Bart de Jong

Read 6507 times

Traveling is a part of BMX. A big part. Meeting riders at their home turf is always interesting. Where do they ride? What do they eat? How do they get around? How many riders are there? Iceland was a new terrain for me. Expectations weren't high simply because I didn't know what to expect. Anton Arnarson has always been the contact for foreign riders who wanted to explore the island. On this trip the request came in through the UCI. The first Icelandic BMX Freestyle Championships were on the program and a request came in for some help in setting up the contest, judging and in general be introduced to BMX Freestyle in Iceland. As explained, new countries to visit is always interesting and Iceland had not been ticked off so off we went.

On arrival Erla picked me up and we went to Mountain Dew to pick up some drinks for the contest. After checking in and a little tour we went straight to the park where we met up with Johann Borgthorsson, the sports director of the BFH club. The first impression was good. The park was indoors, had some fun obstacles and I could picture a good comp taking place here the next day. The BFH club is the only indoor ramp park in Iceland and set up to get the kids into skateboarding and BMX. Anton Arnarson, Ari Ranveigarson and Sindri Hauksson were instrumental in building the park which is a mix of flatbanks and transition ramps with a small mini, rainbow wallride, rail, hips, box, ledge and everything else they could fit in the former fire patrol station. It's not the biggest indoor place on earth, but if you only have 4 months with decent daylight, you will be happy to be able to turn on the

lights when it gets dark early during the '8-month' wintertime. Saying that, the weather was nice all weekend long but still more than half the temparature of Spain the week before. 12 degrees during the day, 7 at night. Nothing a jacket can't fix.

The big day for Iceland-freestyle was Saturday 12 August. The gates of the park opened at 11:00hr for the riders to get some warm-up. With four classes on the schedule getting some park time was key. Most of the riders were local or use this park to ride on a regular basis but getting warmed up for qualifying was on everyone's program. At 13:00hr the sheets were prepared, the riders were briefed and the judges were in place. Time for the comp to start. Qualifications were used to seed the riders order for the final. It gave everyone some contest experience as for most riders this was their first contest ever. Some free practice took place after qualifying while the sheets were prepared for the finals. Two 1-minute runs each. Both runs count. With DJ Johann's gangsta rap and guitar rock blasting out of the speakers the riders got fired up.

Gunmar Aron Jonsson was the winner of the 7-9 class. Soon enough he'll have more riders to compete against when he tells the story to his friends at school and they will also get a bike and make their way to the BFH park. Magnus Sigurbjornsson's 86,2 got him the title in the 10-12 year old class while Egill Steingrimur Arnason won the 13-15 category. Most riders competed in the Elite class. Four riders stood out. Making the podium would be tough because you don't want to be that guy in fourth missing the top 3. Gudgei Simon Stefansson who killed it in qualifying got a score of 89,8 and ended up in fourth place. A few too many mistakes were costly, he could and maybe should have been able to make that top three. Nikolas Svansson however showed up late and did not have much practice. After doing two runs in qualifying and then spending some extra time on the course between qualifying and finals helped him get used to the course. The 90,9 points got the stylish rider the bronze in Iceland. Magnus Bjarki Thorlindsson was on his way to a possible first place before making a few too many mistakes which hurt his score enough to get stuck on second place. Magnus has the tech tricks but also went big in the BFH park, a good combo to see. Sindri Hauksson rode differently and brought 360-s over the box, flairs, big wall plants, downside whips, grinds and all sorts of tricks on the park he helped build. Sindri's riding wasn't flawless but he held it together a tad better than the others to grab the national BMX Freestyle title of Iceland.

It's great to see BMX Freestyle being alive in other parts of the world. Having to work with the weather circumstances in Iceland isn't the easiest but indoor places like this keep the scene alive and gives the kids a place to develop their skills. With riders such as Anton teaching them the ins and outs the scene will only grow. Events like this are also a motivation for the kids to get out there and keep progressing although having a good time is key. Thanks to everyone for the great time. Iceland, check.

BdJ

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