Red Bull Rampage 2014: Finally the Finals Photo Epic
THAT'S IT, THAT'S ALL
Those who were able to stick around for the delayed Red Bull Rampage finals here in Virgin, Utah were greatly rewarded today; the riders threw down on quality dirt and in perfect weather. The Red Bull flags at the top of the course flapped in the wind as riders dropped in continuously to the shock and amazement of everyone, producing big tricks and big crashes. The camaraderie that had grown between organizers, athletes, media and fans, in thwarting Mother Nature and ending this season with a bang despite the difficulties of flash floods and lightening could be felt in the air. Spirits were high as Andreu stoked the crowd on his victory lap and Zink high fived the audience after his 3'ing his drop. Kids navigated the finish corral asking for autographs of their heroes and not wanting the event to be over yet. We felt the same way as we drove away one last time on the dusty and windy road. Exhausted from the last few days and looking forward to being home at the end of a long season, our team was still sad to have it behind us. We find ourselves already talking about what next year may bring.
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 Cam, envisioning what he would do, then doing it, as simple as that. |
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| The bummer news of the morning, Aggy's knee was too hurt to compete. |
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| Andreu had the look this morning. |
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| Our sport has gone big time, in beige duffle bags no less. |
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| Gully was READY! |
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| Showing the true gnar of the entrance to Kyle and Cam's line. It was a cliff face, not a drop, a jagged cliff face. Kyle is charging it here. |
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| Kyle's massive no hander drop. |
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| Strait - run number two with a super man off the RZR hit. |
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| Kyle Strait on his run in the finals. |
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| Lyle laying out a huge super man over the booter for the first time. |
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| Cam Zink on the way to his insane 360 off the monster drop that he hit for the first time only the day before. |
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| Zink's 360 off the big drop. |
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| Zink's threes off his massive drop were not for the faint of heart. |
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| Cam Zink. |
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| Gully on stage two of his deadly double drop. |
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| Gully busts out the gull wings for a perfect suicide no hander. |
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| Gully all corked out. |
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| Mike Montgomery with another uber gnarly entrance! |
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| McGazza on his back flip attempt across the canyon gap. Like Raboul, things didn't quite go as planned for the big Kiwi, with a case on the knuckle ending his bid for the podium. |
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| Semenuk - dropping in. |
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| Semenuk - top drop off the nose of the mountain. |
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| Semenuk - flip can. |
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| Semenuk pulling a nasty three drop. |
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| Brandon with his signature style. |
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| Brandon Semenuk's runs were perfectly executed. |
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| Herb making backflips over 75ft gaps look easy. |
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| Herbage - upside down and hangin' with the heli. |
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| Tom VanSteenbergen's attempt at a front flip over the canyon gap. |
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| VanSteez was banged up but ok after his front flip attempt. |
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| Norbs cracks a perfect three off the drop on his first run. |
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| Norbs - 360 off a drop that he and Semenuk built. |
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| Kyle Norbraten - no hander step down. |
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| Rheeder casually spinning a 3 on the upper ridge. |
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| Brett Rheeder backflip. |
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| Rheeder - backflip number two. |
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| Brett setting up for the Polaris booter. |
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| Paul Bass had one of the coolest lines out there, a work of art. |
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| Basagoitia - stoked to see him back in the thick of it. |
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| Szymon Godziek backflip. The level has definitely gone up since the last Rampage; casually backflipping the canyon gap was the norm. |
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| Judges ridge and Tomas Genon. |
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| Carson was riding incredibly out there today. However, his second run had a little mishap with a flip at the top of his line. |
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| Carson Storch (not pictured). |
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| Storch sending it off the GoPro sender with the suicide no-hander. |
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| The first of Brendog's canyon gaps. |
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| Brendog throwing some style off the first of his two canyon gaps. |
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| Fairclough contemplated backflipping this jumps, but in the end a clean suicide no hander was in order. |
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| Fairclough, over the first of his double gaps. |
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| Brendog, off the GoPro drop. |
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| Fairclough sending it off the GoPro step down. |
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| Mitch Chubey dropping into the notch to get into the meat and potatoes of his run. |
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| Where's Waldo? Louis Reboul unfortunately did not land this massive backflip over the canyon gap. Heal up, budday! |
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| There were a few back flips in a row over the canyon gap today. Louis Reboul with a lofty one! |
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| Andreu cracking a beautiful table along the ridge, mid run. |
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| Andreu Lacondeguy was very serious and focused before going on course today. After placing fourth three times, he was not settling again. |
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| Andreu Lacondeguy drops into his finals run. |
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| Yes, it's true, the Spaniard took off from where those spectators are. |
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| Lacondeguy in the finals. |
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| Lacondeguy putting on a show, after he found out that the big hitters didn't beat his score. |
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| Andreu on a victory lap - just a simple flat spin 3 of the RZR booter, nothing too complicated. |
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| Andreu. |
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| Andreu Lacondeguy wins. |
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| Andreu and his digger crew. |
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| Andreu with the victory starting to sink in - Thomas was wrapping up his run and the win was obvious even before the judge's tally on Genon was announced. |
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| Media feeding frenzy. |
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| Semenuk lands a high five on Lacondeguy. |
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| Lacondeguy in good company on the top step between two previous winners. |
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| Zink, Lacondeguy and Semenuk - your Rampage 2014 podium. |
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| Celebration time! |
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| Podiums. |
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| Nico Vink, Graham Agassiz, and Makken Haugen...couldn't be happier to see their fellow Fest Series teammate finally win it. |
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| Norbs and Herb. |
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| Brett Rheeder. |
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| Second place, but the 360 heard round the world was nothing but insane. Cam Zink taking home second place and the best trick award. Mental! |
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| Brandon Semenuk - winner of the FMB overall. |
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| Rheeder and Semenuk celebrate top spots in FMB overall. |
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| Brendog congratulating his diggers on all their hard work this week. |
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| Herb smooching a rattle snake. |
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| Rat-a-tat rattlesnake. |
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| Aggy and crew. |
Check out all of our images from the Red Bull Rampage 2014 here.
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1 - scores given to Norbs and Andreu show that they wanted to redeem their judging from previous years... I even think that they scored Strait lower cause they know that last year was actually not his to win (McGaaaza/Zink)
2 - if industry and society knows your nickname, it means that you deserve extra points. If I compare "Herb's" run and (just) Szymon Godziek's run, I see this "unfairness". You can even see it in photo subtitles: Szymon's was like "regular walk on the street - everybody does that and it is nothing special" and Herb's was like "OMG! What a style and streezzz! These guys push the sport to another level with tricks like that".
...and now I'll go to drink some sweet banana juice cause that judging at Rampage made me bitter!
Really though, you're seriously over thinking things. Maybe Norbs got a better run this time around because he deserved it and the judges realized that. Maybe they scored Andreu so high because he finally stomped his desired run (last year his second run wasn't counted but was easily considered one of the best runs). Comparing results to PB image descriptions? haha this is hilarious. Where's my tinfoil hat? But really though, if you knew a bit about how they judged these events, the results wouldn't surprise you but would rather give you hope for this event to continue onward.
But hey, opinions are like a*sholes, right?
I just can't get out of my head this feeling that there at the top, within judges were some "The Fest series" producer/beneficiaries;]
I guess I need more banana juice ;]
Andrew scored 7 or 8% more than everybody else...if Zink and Semenuk didnt pass him on the second run...it was very unlikely that the other riders did...i know it sounds disrespectfull for the others riders, but he decided not to risk his life again
Zinc: Not as smooth or confident in upper section. Yes, backflips the sender but then nothing for the rest of the course.
McGazza: Got marked down for too much traversing to get to the canyon gap on an 'easy' ridge line, even though had a sick off-axis flip on the way it doesn't compare to Zinc/Strait goat-path. Yes massive flip over the canyon, but then got a bit wobbly on the step-down after that and got off his line so didn't hit his last two jumps. Doesn't matter how you look at it, that drops points.
Result? Strait clear winner.
As for 2014: Lacondeguy's score seemed a little high, but it's the same as Strait the year before. No hesitation coming in to any features, hit some *massive* stuff, the whole time with wicked speed - fastest down the hill I swear - and still had style and amplitude for days. Deserved winner.
unreal event! freaking awesome riding skills fellas!
im still stoked, cant wait for the freaking replay!!!
- Zink scored way too high again for a one-trick pony albeit with a technical line up top thrown in this time.
- Strait scored too low I think, his run was super gnar from top to bottom and had some big tricks.
McGazza should have been disqualified for proving he's actually a cyborg and therefore shouldn't be competing... nobody just walks away laughing like that after stacking a 72ft gap . :-P
Definitely an amazing Rampage and glad to see no serious injuries this time
Also, it should go without saying that news goes beyond the bloody and the broken; but the PB community cares about the athletes in our sport and I'm surer I'm not the only one who is curious about how these fine folks are doing.
Thanks PB and Redbull for the coverage!
No, they were watching it on the RedBull website and if there was a problem with their internet connection they didn't give the rider any points...
Of course they had live feeds from all the cameras, it's the same in every professional sport (apart from football).
Don't get me wrong huge respect to all the riders, they've got huge Kahuna's for sure. Just thought Rheeder should have scored more, cheers buddy.
We got Speed wheelies, Norby, Steel horses, Fairclaw, and "Run of the day for Lecondegay" I know I missed a couple others. NBC have your announcers do some research that was embarrassing.
Last year I felt like Cam should have gotten best trick and probably 4th over all. This year from what little I've seen I like the way things played out. Cam is always throwing down the gnar. Dude has some of the biggest nuts on earth. Not just in the world of MTB but in the world.
I look forward to digging through more photos and more video. The course lay out looked bonkers. Hitters freaking everywhere.
It was nice to see them take a step back and extend the event to get people runs. Had they done that last year I'm not so sure that Tyler McCaul isn't sitting on the podium.
Nice to see the event taking in rider input and input in general. Looked like a solid event.
Glad most folks are on two feet after this one.
That being said, the announcing really detracted from it for me. Cramming as many buzzwords in as possible, obviously having little actual knowledge of mtb. It sounds like they attended a seminar before announcing to learn the lingo. Going on about sponsored features even when the rider wasn't hitting them, and not understanding riders lines. I don't expect them to know every trick name, but calling manuals speed wheelies and referring the the rear forks on a dh bike and constantly mentioning they have suspension was a bit much. Surely there is a better group off riders that can do announcing for the event?!
"Hi all, Thanks for you messages!! I have nothing broken and I'm happy to be alive... #Rampage was totally insane for me and was the best experience in my life.. Thanks @juleslangeard @peferry and @thomasgenon for helping me today "
his bike after the crash:
fr-fr.facebook.com/26in.fr/photos/a.93812248022.111869.93422278022/10152795734788023/?type=1&relevant_count=1
/LOL
I mean like always norbs got kinda robbed... but brendogs ratings got raped....
AAnnd... who put that music in there???
it made everything less spectacular
I really just had to complain about those judges...(well.. and the commentating... it already has been said often enough)
However those runs were extreamly sick.. love rampage
http://www.redbull.tv/Redbulltv