Levi LaVallee is the poster child for dynamite comes in small packages. I met him back at X Games in LA a few years ago and the guy is short, full of life and loves a good party. On top of all that he rides a snowmobile like a man possessed! Check out his latest web video where he cruises the streets of his home town, its pretty dam ridiculous.
Some people see the world as a playground, where anything and everything can and will be a shreddable obstacle. As a kid growing up in Minnesota, Levi LaVallee looked at his state’s capital Saint Paul like a ripe fruit, begging to be plucked…and ripped to shreds on his snowmobile. A land of opportunity that only he could see, it was his mission to take that city over on his trusty sled. Now, he’s done it.
Two weekends ago saw Africa’s top snowboarders and skiers compete in the 2015 Xperia Winter Whip Snowboard and Ski Jam. The event took part on Saturday, 15 August 2015 at the Afriski Mountain Resort in Lesotho, and welcomed athletes from around South Africa and Lesotho, as well as a further 9 international riders from Canada, New Zealand and Slovenia.
The Resort’s Kapoko Park was pristinely groomed and prepared over a number of weeks, in order to provide the competitors with a top-class slopestyle course to lay down their best tricks and vie for a podium position.
The Amateur division was the largest and most competitive of the day, with judges giving progression precedence throughout the day. David Copperfeel, a local rider from the Wits Ski Club put down some impressive runs and finished in 3rd place. Jason Lammers looked good to defend his 2014 title, including some steezy transfers and good amplitude in his runs, but it wasn’t enough to beat the scale and progression from Sean Irwin who claimed victory, leaving Lammers to settle for 2nd place.
JTK returned for another competition year and dominated in the Ski division taking the win convincingly with a variety of big airs, switch backflips, 360’s and a frontflip over the final feature of the course – the Ugandan Stall Rail. Slovenian skiers, Patrick Matula and Karol Hierweg put on a big battle for 2nd place with Matula claiming it in the end and Hierweg taking home 3rd.
Among the cash and product prizes, Amateur Snowboarder and Ski division winners, Sean Irwin and JTK both also took home Xperia M4 Aqua phones.
The only entrant into this year’s Junior division was 10 year old, Erin Nel, who also insisted on riding with the Ladies division in their jam session. Nel didn’t hold anything back, hitting all of the course’s big kickers and technical rail sections, taking the Junior division win. More impressive is that Nel’s overall score would have put her into 3rd place in the Ladies division – a serious future contender in ladies snowboarding.
In the Ladies division, Vanessa Jackson showed consistency in her runs throwing down a solid 180 switch 50-50 to 180 out on the flatbox to finish in 3rd position. Slovenian Martina Molnarova had solid rails, cab 180’s and switch rails featured in her runs to put her in 2nd place. Mawa Jekot was again unbeatable and defended her 2014 title with cab 360’s, frontside 360’s and steezy rails. Jekot’s 1st place also saw her win one of two Club Med prizes consisting of an all-inclusive snow holiday for two to Club Med Val Thorens in France.
The Pro Men division was the last on course for the day, never disappointing with some extremely impressive riding from all the competitors. A very close battle took place between Luke Dutton and Dean van Greunen. Dutton threw down 360’s and front lips over the kickers and a big 360 over the rainbow rail. Van Greunen had Backside 540’s on lock and solid rail riding, but it was van Greunen’s use of course and hitting all the features, that counted in his favour as he edged out Dutton for 2nd place. Canada’s Liam Roy was dominant with his technical rail riding, switch frontside’s, backflips and 360’s to take the overall. Being the top South African finisher, van Greunen took home the second Club Med prize for an all-inclusive snow holiday for two to Club Med Val Thorens.
Xperia Winter Whip organiser, Ryan van der Spuy said, “This year’s event was a huge feat and we cannot thank all those involved enough – from the athletes who continue to share their passion for the sport, judges who gave their time to score each run, the media who have helped spread the word, the medics onsite, Kapoko Park parkies and Afriski Resort who provided us with a top grade course and facilities, the spectators and our incredible sponsors. We have received such great support from our sponsors this year; Sony Mobile, Club Med, Red Bull, Skullcandy, Neff, Jägermeister, G-Form and Burton, all of whom helped to make the 2015 Xperia Winter Whip a great success”.
Celebrations went on late into the night at the Gondola Café with resident DJ Black Sparrow and a live performance from SDO.
2015 Xperia Winter Whip Results
Amateur:
1st Sean Irwin
2nd Jason Lammers
3rd Wesley Schallen
Ski:
1st JTK
2nd Patrick Matula
3rd Karol Hierweg
Junior:
1st Erin Nel
Ladies:
1st Mawa Jekot
2nd Martina Molnarva
3rd Vanessa Jackson
Pro Men:
1st Liam Roy
2nd Dean van Greunen
3rd Luke Dutton
I guess snowmobile is quite the exotic past time to us South Africans. We simply just have no comprehension of what it is about. Watching this edit makes me wanna try it though. Incredible footage, marvellous edit and a great track. Pretty sure you will really enjoy watching it.
The four time Sledfilm Festival winner, for Best Snowmobile Motion Picture, is back with a high-octane thrill ride. Volume 10 is the milestone tenth film in our award winning, backcountry, snowmobile series. Featuring the industry’s top athletes including Chris Burandt, Brett Turcotte, Dan Adams, Cory Davis, Sahen Skinner, Ross Robinson, Joey Junker, Cody Borchers, Jay Mentaberry, Reagan Sieg, Dave McClure, Rob Kincaid, Riley Suhan, David Sharp Jr. and many more! Filmed in majestic backcountry locations across the United States and Canada, Volume 10 is unquestionably our best snowmobile film to date.
Filmed by: Michael Reeve & Stephen Clark
Edited by: Michael Reeve
Trailer Song: “Jail Break” by Awolnation
Wow! I mean wow! Did you watch the Burton US Open and did you see with your own eyes how the game was changed forever? First off we had Taku Hiraoka and the rest of the Halfpipe squad going absolutely mental. But the big show had to go to the new phenom, Yuki Kadono in the Slopestyle event. Marc McMorris was his usual incredible self, but even he could not stop Yuki from winning, when the kid was dropping back to back 1620’s. Watch his run and realise that Pro Snowboarding has just gone up a level once again. Then watch the finals highlights from both the Halfpipe and Slopestyle and be amazed by the level across both the women’s and men’s events. Simply blows my mind!
Surfers will deal with a lot of things to get a good surf in, even surfing during the “Biggest” blizzard of the year. Historic Blizzard, Juno hits Montauk, NY and the local Surfers took advantage of the empty line up to get some decent waves under the belt.
Take super modified trucks, usually raced in Desert conditions, some of the craziest drivers on the planet and dump them in the snow and you get Red Bull Frozen Rush. There are always major moments that stand out in your memory at any event. Whether they mean much in the end or not, those moments are spectacular on their own. The 2015 edition of Red Bull Frozen Rush had more than a few instances that made fans cringe or cheer (or both), five of which you can see in the video below.
This literally is truck porn, if you love the Ford F150 Raptor, snowboarding and Ken Block. Why freeze your butt off with a snowmobile when you can travel the backcountry in style with your F150 Raptor?
Ken Block takes his Ford F-150 RaptorTRAX out to the Baldface Lodge in Nelson, British Columbia to put it to the test as the ultimate backcountry snowboard expedition vehicle, along with fellow Monster Energy athletes Zak Hale and Ethan Deiss.
This is the first time in over 10 years that I have missed the annual snowboard contest in South Africa. I am pretty damn bleak about it, especially watching the video and realising what a great weekend the boys and gals had. People are always amazed when I talk about snowboarding in Africa, but the bottom line is that if you wanna ride a fun park, you don’t need to travel abroad! Even world famous web boarder and pro, Marko Grilc, was impressed, just see his video below the comp one.
Results:
Juniors 1 – Eduan Enslin
Amateur 1 – Jason Lammers 2 – Graham Sepata 3 – Wesley SchallenOpen
Ladies 1 – Mawa Jekot 2 – Vanessa Jackson 3 – Tamara SusaOpen
Men 1 – Andrew Le Roux 2 – Luke Dutton 3 – Dean van Greunen
Ski 1 – JTK 2 – Augusto Risso 3 – Alexander Travers
A New Year and the XGames keep on growing bigger and bigger. With winter events in Aspen and Russia coming up, the first of the “real” contests begins with urban snowboarding. The competition pits 8 pro boarders against one another, but not in an event on location, but rather in a video edit battle voted for by us, the public. Just watch the teaser and be blown away by the ridiculous stunts these guys are doing.
Today I felt like I needed some inspiration and then this trailer literally jumped out of my recommended watch list on Youtube. I cannot wait to watch the full movie.
The epic rivalry between half-pipe legends Kevin Pearce and Shaun White is documented in this exhilarating ride into the world of extreme snowboarding. With both practicing more and more breathtaking and dangerous tricks leading up to the Vancouver Winter Olympics, everything suddenly changes for Kevin when a horrific crash leaves him fighting for his life. When he recovers, all he wants to do is get on his snowboard again, even though medics and family fear it could kill him.
