Bestwick Makes It 5 In A Row. Wins Florida, wins Dew cup.

Oct 17, 2009

Written by Bart de Jong

Read 3108 times

It’s yet another day in Florida when Mother Nature ushered in the rain. But lucky for the Dew Tour BMX Vert Finals, the Amway arena is indoor, nice and spacious with really high ceilings. That's a good thing, because you need high ceilings for Vert, especially when Jamie Bestwick is riding. How high he airs is unreal–plain and simple. But enough about Florida, let's cut to the chase: Jamie Bestwick took first. In doing so, he won the Dew Cup in Vert for the fifth year in a row, and became the first person to sweep all

the stops in a season. It’s almost pointless to go into great detail describing his style, his arsenal of wild maneuvers, and how high he can blast. You really have to see him live and in-person. It’s pure spectacle.

Concentrating on his first run, Jamie fired out an Indian air seat grab, floated a couple extended tuck no-handers, connected downside whips higher than some people can air, and somehow managed to pull off an alley-oop downside whip over the channel. Jamie floated the downside whip so far that it almost ejected him off the ramp after landing. But with a little bit of finesse, he took control and remained afloat to finish his run with a foot-plant flair. There was no need for him to put too much effort into his second run--his first sealed the deal.

Coming in second today was Chad Kagy, who also took over second place in the overall standings. The guy is a variation wizard. He conjured up endless wild moves beginning with a super-man seat grab over the channel, perfect flair-whips, absolutely amazing inverts, x-up nac-nacs, and the virtually impossible superman seat-grab bar spin. For some riders, this variation would take years to attempt. Kagy, however, does it every time. His first run was a charm. His second run, not so much after a double whip gone awry. With 326 total points for the year, Kagy just barely edged above Steven McCann in the overall standings, who came in third with 322 points.

Stevie had come in third at every stop so far this year, but today, that spot on the podium went to Kevin Robinson. K-Rob has his runs down pat giving each wall got a dose of something—an alley-oop 270, an alley-oop flat spin, a perfectly stretched super-man, an amazing opposite no-handed flair over the channel gap, and to top things off, Robinson threw in some back to back flairs. A solid first run for sure, but his bail on a flat spin 540 cut his second run a bit short. With 278 total points, Kevin Robinson ended up in fourth.

Honorable mentions? Let's go with Steve McCann to start. Landing fourth place in today’s finals, McCann pulled two flawless runs including a no-handed 540, a perfect superman seat grab, and a bar-spin to whip at some serious heightt–consistent and dialed. Jimmy Walker (sixth place) was, as usual, all over the ramp. His banger for the day came in the form of a 900—his first ever. Looping out on first attempt, his second run couldn’t have been any more perfect. Congrats to him on overcoming that demon.

Fransisco “Coco” Zurita (fifth) and Vince Byron (ninth) were at it again with plenty of new school flair. Coco’s ridiculously high airs to late inverts are simply amazing.

And lastly, serious props go out to Australia’s Tim Wood. Tim went down from a back tire hang up on a 900 attempt, and despite hitting hard enough to eventually need seven stitches in his chin, he recovered almost immediately and came back for his second run. The trick to this was Tim simply getting up after the fall. And to boot, he finishe

d his second run throwing down a cache of goodies.

2009 BMX Vert Overall standings
1 Jamie Bestwick 300
2 Steven McCann 246
3 Chad Kagy 236
4 Simon Tabron 214
5 Jimmy Walker 208
6 Kevin Robinson 196
7 Vince Byron 184
8 Francisco Zurita 172
9 Dennis McCoy 161
10 Jay Eggleston 151
11 Zack Warden 145
12 Koji Kraft 144
13 Austin Coleman 130
14 Tim Wood 120
15 Danny Williams 103
16 Jorge Jovel 99