The 2007 US Open Footbag Championships July 6-8

[Zeb Jackson]

<-- us open champion....

i have a feeling a mysterious bat will end up careening with some people shins. but ill wear my shin guards so that i may become victorious

see ya tomorrow red...i think were bringin bomberman with us...

"This time...Its for Real."

[LEGOMAN]

WOOOO

I'm leaving tonight.

No Wii =(((( I couldn't get it from my friend in time. sorry guys =(

[Stuge47]

Me, Dan and Daniel are leaving tomorrow at around 11....

[sampotter]

See everyone tomorrow.

[mosher]

Have fun footbag people that I mostly haven't met!!

I still feel like I knooooow you all though.

I tell everyone heelloooo!


I wanted to surprise fly out or like.. fly back to Oregon instead of Toronto but that proved impossible. It's the thought that counts right?

Have fun!

[redshredz]

I highly recommend everyone mapquest/google maps these locations prior to heading down to Portland, it will make it easier for ya. See you at Pioneer Square Friday!
R

Friday July 6th

Demos
Pioneer Square 2pm
Downtown Portland, 6th and SW Morrison

Registration
Kenny Shults/Kendall Kic's House 6-10pm
3550 SW Kanan Dr.
Portland OR. 97221

Saturday July 7th
Willamette Park (with net)
Southwest Macadam Avenue and Nebraska Street, Portland, OR 97219
Prelims
1pm Intermediate Shred 30
1:30pm Open Shred 30 (one round)

2pm Intermediate Big Trick

2:30pm Intermediate Big Three
3:00pm Open Big Three

3:30pm Intermediate Routines
4:00pm Open Routines, first round

5pm Intermediate Rippin' Run
5:30 Circle (Open only)


Sunday
Pioneer Square (Finals)
1pm Rippin' Run (open only)
1:30pm Big Trick (Open)
2:30 Open Routines, finals

[shreddaily]

I saw Justin D hit a beautiful blurry flurrie then next try hit a perfect stepping ducking symp dlo. i was impressed.

[Maraxus]

Edited due to Red's official listings.

[ObArA'BaRs]

alpine whirly and alpine food is a tough decesion,but I think the whirly should have taken the lead.(this opinion doesnt matter )

[Maraxus]

It was a tough decision on the sick one all around. I really dont know how clean any of my shit was, but I didn't think I deserved the medal because of questionable counterparts. Oh well, heres a list:

Seven sevens were hit, and a lot of sixes:

Alpine Gig (penske)
Alpine Food (dale)
Blurry Symp Rev Whirling Swirl (Schmaltz)
Montage (Bevier)
Gyro Food (me)
Blurry Merlin (me)
Shooting ss dlo (dale)
Backside bedwetter (bevier)
Nuclear Symp Whirl (Landes)
Food (potter)
Whirlygig (potter)

I think more were hit but I only watched and heard so much. Really crazy though that everyone hit.

[redshredz]

Hey all,
We have just official concluded the 2007 US Open Footbag Championships! This was the most fun I have had running an event thus far, more on that in the overall wrap up. We have one more day, the annual Water Temple shred, but here are the immediate results;


Intermediate Big 3
1. Dylan Johnson (Diwalk-Blizzard-Tripwalk)
2. Jake Wren (Paradon-Ripwalk-Down Double Down)
3. Kyle Hewitt (Phoenix-Blurry Whirl-Osis)
4. Zac Jackson (Ripwalk-Paradox Mirage-Ducking Butterfly)


Intermediate Sick Trick
1. Jake Wren (Locomotion)
2. Zac Jackson (Frontside Atom Smasher)
3. Dylan Johnson (P.S. Whirl)
4. Kyle Hewitt (Fairy Ducking Butterfly)

Intermediate Rippin' Run
1. Kyle Hewitt
2. Zac Jackson


Intermediate Shred 30
1. Kyle Hewitt (145.24)
2. Jake Wren (134.35)
3. Dylan Johnson (119.28 )
4. Zac Jackson (94.49)

Intermediate Routines
1. Kyle Hewitt
2. Jake Wren
3. Zac Jackson

Kyle Hewitt is the 2007 Intermediate US Footbag Champion


Open Sick 3
1. Jim Penske (Nemesis-P.S. Whirl-Spinning Blender)
2. Justin Dale (Shooting Butterfly-Food Processor-Mind Bender)
3. Nick Landes (Gyro Ducking Butterfly-P.S. Whirl-Spinning DLO)
4. Scott Bevier (Sumo-Fairy Beater-Blurry Whirl)

Open Sick Trick
1. Aaron Orton (Surging Blender)
2. Justin Dale (Apline Food Processor)
3. Jim Penske (Alpine Whirly Gig)
4. Scott Bevier (Montage)
5. Nick Landes (Nuclear Symposium Whirl)
6. Ben Schmaltz (Blurry Symposium Reverse Whirling Swirl)
7. Sam Potter (Food Processor)
8. Daryl Genz (Triple Around the World)

Open Rippin' Run
1. Jim Penske
2. Scott Bevier
3. Evan Lovely

Circle
1. Jim Penske
2. Nick Landes
3. Scott Bevier
4. Justin Dale


Open Shred 30
1. Jim Penske (240)
2. Justin Dale (176.67)
3. Scott Bevier (168.13)
4. Sam Potter (165.72)
5. Evan Lovely (159.60)
6. Nick Landes (147)
7. Daryl Genz (119.53)

Open Routines
1. Jim Penske
2. Scott Bevier
3. Justin Dale
4. Daryl Genz
5. Nick Landes
6. Aaron Orton

Jim Penske is the 2007 US Footbag Champion

Congratulations to all of the players, thanks for making it a great event. Much more to come!
R

[max]

interesting sick 1 rankings. I guess "you had to be there" but instinctively I'd place 3x atw and nuclear op symp. whirl much higher than their rankings above.

Props to all, intermediate and open!

[ericksonj]

Congrats on the 1st place sick 1 Aaron!

Sounds like the event was a blast, sorry I couldn't make it up. Red, we will have to come up to portland in the next couple weeks to kick with the crew. Sounds like Portland is blowing up with freestylers.

[mc]

props to penske and aaron! can't wait to see video!!!

[bustinjustin]

Judging sick one was the hardest of all, the judges did a great job over the whole weekend. Daryl's triple around the world was really a pixie double around the world (clearly) so that is why it ranked so low.
I think the ranking should have gone a little differently. I think Ben should have been first with his blurry ps rev. whirling swirl. There is an argument here that he didn't finess this trick but it's such a power move that no one else does I think It should be a bit unrefined (this was only his second time ever hitting this move). Aarons move was also a bit unrefined but he had that wow effect similar to when Penske hit Blurry Ducking Drifter at CSS that one year, which is why he won sick trick. I think Nick should have then been third with his perfect straight up and down nuclear symp whirl (it was really pretty!). Then me at fourth. Although there is a lot of debate with which of these 7's takes the cake. For me personally I think Alpine Food is harder (my opinion, there could be so much debate behind this). Here's the logic. Stepping ducking is harder that spinning ducking so Jim's move was over Gordon's. Now between all three of us (Jim, Gordon and myself we can all hit montage, alpine whirly gig, and alpine food (not sure if gordon hits alpine food)) Personally I think alpine whirly gig is easier, it can be forced and powered through, where the alpine food does take more finess. I'm pretty sure Jim agrees with this as well, and obviously the judges think so too. It was pretty simple for me to pick up alpne whirly gig but It's taken me a couple of months to dial down the consistency for Alpine food to be able to get it for a sick trick.
(I had a really good post all finished and I miss-keyed and erased it all, im really mad because this post isn't nearly as clear sorry. Stupid miss key.)
Thats my two cents what a hard event to judge!
j

[ShredOnLawn]

Sorry I missed it.

Way to take em Kyle and Jim.

[redshredz]

Post Event Wrap Up

I would have posted this earlier, but was out of town directly after the Open. The event ran great! Our numbers were roughly the same in competition as last year in freestyle, while net surprisingly surged in registered attendance greatly. We only had one event that had lower numbers this year, besides that, competitor levels were about the same. General attendance for day 1 was somewhere in between the Northwest Fest and last year's US Open, for day 2 at Pioneer Square, the numbers for freestyle were pretty much the same as last year. Here is a breakdown of the two days and the players involved.

Day 1
Pioneer Square

Everyone was rolling into town on this day, we all converged on Pioneer Square to kick and promote the event. There was about a 5 hour session, with quite a few players both locally and traveling in. It was good to see Jim and Bevier shredding it up in the square, I had a few remarks from on lookers that there were a lot of new faces around the square. We also discovered two new freestylers (with Lavers) who live in the area. Not recognizing them I walked up and asked them where they were from, the replied "here". I was surprised, and asked if they knew there are a massive footbag group in the area. They basically said they had just gotten into it, and the Open was the introduction to them to the larger culture. Glad to have them on board!

After the session downtown, we all headed to Kenny/Kendall's house for registration. This was great fun, we essentially got most of the players signed up, and I was able to do some catching up with old friends. It was a nice meeting of the old school and new school, many introductions were made. About 11pm we all left and headed back to my house to catch some rest for the next day.

Day 2
Willamette Park

This was a new park for us to use, but more beautiful than the previous year's park, mainly due to the fact it was on the waterfront. This day belonged to net really. They signed up another 10 or so people, and the park was packed with net games and players, far more than last year. We were happy about this, it was a good shot in the arm for net in general, felt like the old days a bit. The net players were all pretty pumped about the turn out, we cheered them on.

We rented out two full tennis courts for freestyle, and proceeded to run quite a few events over the course of 6 hours. It was the heaviest day of events I have run thus far, by the end it felt like it had turned into an Iron Man competition, the players were subjected to an endless amount of various competitions, but still performed successfully and professionally. To add to that, it was amazingly hot out that day, we were cooking through most of the events. When people weren't out there competing, they were seeking shade and working not to get burnt. Again however, everyone did a fine job performing. Jim and Flash as usual came through due to their consistent nature, and this was easily Nick's best competition to date. Some special acknowledgments go out to a few players; one intermediate, one professional. Over the course of the two days, Justin Dale really performed well and stepped it up across pretty much every competition. His mix of hard moves and smart play consistency payed off at this event. Also a shout out to Jake Wren, who caught a lot of people's attention (I heard more than a few questions and conversations about him). Jake is a steel-nerved competitor, reminding me of Dave Clavens or Ryan Mulroney, pretty unshakable essentially. He had no routine or shred 30 planned out (or any competition really), and rocked it in almost everyone. A minute and a half is a very very short amount of time for this player. We were joking that he was the 'Jim Twin', they look identical standing next to each other and to a certain degree, playing. Also, Kyle Hewitt showed his resolved and crushed in many of the intermediate competitions, and will be carrying the title of Intermediate US Champion to Worlds this year. Great job Kyle!

I want to give another shout out to the intermediates, who campaigned and won the right to enter Circle this year. I respected this, they threw everything at it they could (all can go guiltless for the most part, and mostly did in the event). They knew they were going to take some hits and pay their dues, but still wanted the experience and stuck to their guns during the event (great job again Kyle). That's what I like to see; non intimidated players! These guys are going to be great open freestylers (very) soon.

Finally, the day ended with Jim winning Circle, Nick taking second place, and Flash rocking third and Justin fourth. It was a long day of events, everyone played well.

Day 3
Pioneer Square

This was the big day for freestyle. Before we even arrived, the Simpson's Movie promotion was under way, and the square was alive with people. We had the stage set up, along with a few different tent/booths, one for the Footbag Hall of Fame, and one for Freedom Footbags (thanks again for the sponsorship D!) We hung banners around the stage, the canopies, and the brick walls around the event. It was a light day for events, only Rippin' Run, Sick Trick, and finals for Routines. Jim rocked again in Rippin' Run, with Bevier second and Evan Lovely third. Evan has stepped it up as a player, he showed consistency all three days and has learned to utilize his shuffle, all to his advantage in competition. Pretty much everyone hit in Sick Trick, again it was Justin's time to shine with his big move arsenal, Nick hit a great new move (Nuclear Symp Whirl), and Ben Schmaltz nailed Blurry Symposium Reverse Whirling Swirl out of nowhere. Aaron Orton pulled it off in the end with Surging Blender to take first. That was probably the toughest event to judge with everything that was hit. Congrats to Aaron in his first competing tournament!

Next were finals for Routines (special thanks to our judges; Sam Potter, Sean Wingert, and Steve Goldberg). Nick showed a great performance that will no doubt be refined further for Worlds. Daryl pulled out his arsenal of combinations from years of past routines to put on a good show. Again, Justin went consistent and stuck his performance. It came down to Flash and Jim, both great routines, but separated by two drops, thus Jim become the 2007 US Footbag Champion. Congrats Jim, it was a one drop masterpiece of a routine we hope to see again at Worlds.

After the competition we inducted four new Portland players onto the official Sole Purpose sponsored team, that list included;

Ben Schmaltz
Sean Wingert
Jack Martin
Alex Bernstein

One by one we called them up on stage to a cheering crowd and gave them a jersey with their name on it. These gents have proven to be beyond committed, we appreciate their input greatly!

After wrapping up the Open, we headed over to Widmer brewery (another great sponsor), leaving a large four square group behind to finish out the evening. Everyone was pretty tired from the two days, thus we all crashed pretty hard that night, but not before going up to Mount Tabor above Portland and checking out the view.

Day 4
Water Temple
We all met up at 2pm at the Water Temple, a ceremonious location we go to shred once or twice a year. The area is basically comprised of various water falls and pools with large platform squares suspended over the water, great for shredding. This year as usual we kicked for about 4.5 hours, swam, and took it easy. From there everyone said their goodbyes, a few of us went to get burritos then called it good. All in all it was a very fun smooth running event, special thanks to the surprise attendees Evan Lovely and Aaron Shepard. With the two new locations, it seems we have really found our best event sites thus far. Willamette Park is right on the water, and Pioneer Square is a very accessible high visibility location.

Finally, a shout out to our sponsors again;

Freedom Footbags
Richie Abshire
World Footbag Association
Fancy Footworks
Flying Clipper
Widmer
Thorne Bay Lodge
Footbag Hall of Fame
The Sole Purpose Founders
Ribbonspecialties
Pinemeadow Golf
John Stalberger
Ted Huff
Steve Goldberg

Thanks for the support! We are have begun to collaborate in regards to the 2008 US Open Footbag Championships. Seems like every year it gets better, we certainly hope this trend will continue. See you next year!
Red
(more pictures, video, and information to come)

[Maraxus]

Great write-up Red, good stuff.

[scott behmer]

i would like to know my shred 30 score if anybody has it

[redshredz]

Hey Scott,
Nick has the scores, I will contact him and see what he can do, otherwise I will re-review it and do the breakdown this next week.

Also, special thanks to Scott for working the music in finals, and to Justin and Evan for once again playing the DJ's at our event.