The Jam at the 2011 US Snowboarding Open

At the 2011 Burton US Open Snowboarding Championships a monster set up progresses the sport to new heights of creativity, skill and daring. This in not your garden variety rail jam. In fact, it's not a rails jam at all, not with two quarter pipes, a big air hip and eight different lines of attack. Yale Cousino makes a comeback after recovering from a torn ACL. Another RadXSports video reported by Dawn Church.

Script:
The sadistic geniuses who designed this setup thought they had created eight different lines to challenge the top pros. But once the mischievous riders hit the features, it quickly became obvious that there were more ways up and down than mere mortals can predetermine, and the snowboard gods had given us a new event.

There were boxes that went both up and down, two cramped quarter pipes squeezed between rail ramps, a big air hip and a gnarly down flat down rail centerpiece that frustrated the best riders most of the night.

The big airs over the hip landing was there the riders threw down the spectacular tricks that wowed the crowd, but it was the tricky rails that set the winners apart from the also rans. The judging was on overall impression, and the judges wanted to see clean hits and a variety of tricks on all the features.

The leaders established themselves early in the 90-minute session. Dylan Dragotta's big grab over the hip helped put him into the third spot in the early going, behind Canadian Jason DuBois who ruled the rails. Fellow Canadian Charles Reid went bigger than anyone else and landed everything, surging into a lead he would hold on to all night long.

We gals were well represented on the monster setup. 2011 TTR World Tour champion Jamie Anderson put down stylish tricks on the rails and over the airs.

Norwegian Kjerstie Buuas, who always seems to finish on the podium, showed why she is one of the best all around riders in the world.

When the ladies jam was over these two, along with Canadian Spenser O'Brien, claimed the podium and the prize money, dancing their way into the night.

The men's contest went on for another 30 minutes. Vermonter Yale Cousino, a favorite with both the crowd and the announcers, was in the elite eight as the jam entered the stretch run.

Cousino tore up his ACL at the last Union Square Street Session in 2008 and has been of fthe scene since then. This was his big coming out party and he had lots of supporters.

Even though he's a rail specialist, it looked like Cousino was going to fall short of a podium finish because he couldn't land a clean run over that down flat down.

Then, with a little over a minute left, Cousino laid down this run.

Category:

Sports

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• snowboarding
• snow
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• Burton
• snowboards
• jam
• rails
• quarterpipe
• airs
• tricks
• jumps
• spins
• twists
• air
• big air
• innovation
• challenge
• action
• extreme sports
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• Stratton
• Vermont

[MrCrazyguy912]

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