“Moose! Moose! Go grab me a beer.” With not much more than a snort and a few beads of saliva thrown into the air, Moose, my friend’s brown lab, is nothing more than a blur headed towards the refridgerator. Grabbing a hold of an old sock attached to the door handle, he gives it a yank and flings the fridge open and plunges head first in search of the nearest beer.

When I found out that the Summit at Snoqualamie was hosting one of this year’s Ride Shakedown events, I had to make my way there and check it out. It’s pretty sweet having a dog bring you beer and wait for you to finish it so he can get you another. It’s even better when that’s followed up by an awesome event that is put on by Ride snowboards and Dizzle entertainment; with similar treatment of course.

Being that this was the first time the event was hosted in the United States, I had never had the opportunity to see such a unique event go down first hand. The event spans across two full days with amateurs and pros alike competing for $35,000 in total cash prizes. Friday was a qualifier round that puts the top three amateur riders into the semi-finals against all of the invited pros.

With a ton of fresh snow, fog, sun, sleet, and wind, the riders were having to adapt to a difficult course and still managed to put it all out on the line. A lot of heavy tricks and gnarly bails went down for sure, enough to leave the crowd gasping and then cheering as the night went on. Ultimately, it was Manuel Diaz, Tanner Davidson, and Colin Clarke who edged forward and gained their chance to compete in the Saturday’s event.

I must say that rail events are really scary to watch when everyone is so hungry to enter the gates of Gnarnia. While there were a lot of talented runs going down, local Washington favorite, Austin Hironaka must have been on a slightly different wavelength. Judges Peter Line, Patrick McCarthy, Etienne Gilbert, and David Aubrey were in agreement that he should be crowned champ. Following in his footsteps and actually sharing some dance moves, Isabelle Lalive went on to win for the ladies, stomping clean off of the handrail.

Saturday’s event went down in a similar fashion. Schizophrenic weather, intense riding, and some heavy falls were the main event. In the end, it was Eman Anderson (third), Chile’s own Manuel Diaz (second), and Matts Kulisek (first) taking podium finishes for the men, and Megan Whiteside (third), Hana Beaman (second), and Megan Ginter winning for the ladies. Watch the first video I’ve edited in a while and see some of action for yourselves. Watch out filmers, photographers can shoot in HD now.

A side note: sorry, but hybridized energy drinks are not good for you and anything with sugar, oil, and weird isolated proteins is not edible. I blew it by not following people around and recording their reactions as they took their first sip.

All the action continues on April 2^nd and 3^rd when the event finishes at Mont Saint Sauveur in Quebec, Canada, so get your jib stick and your passport (for most of us) and be there!

For more information on the event visit: http://www.rideshakedown.com