The 8th Annual Hot Dawgz & Hand Rails at Bear Mountain proved to be nothing short of incredible. Each year Clayton Shoemaker and the rest of the Bear terrain park staff set the bar higher for what is possible at a summer snowboarding event and this year was no exception. Creating the biggest and most diverse course to date as well as utilizing the most snow in the history of the event, they truly created something unseen at HDHR before.

The tent city sponsor village provided the crowd of an estimated 12,000 people with ample entertainment. Each sponsor had a unique game or challenge to win free product and enough free swag to clothe a refugee camp for years.
The guys at ThirtyTwo kept the crowd entertained by letting them shoot a nerf dart at a target board with a range of prizes on it. They were also generous enough to give me a bottle of water to stay hydrated while I was navigating the crowd.

The best part of the sponsor village was perhaps the people watching, girls dressed to impress or distract their favorite pros, guys showing off their tattoos, and of course the little kids running around trying to collect the most stickers possible.

Like I mentioned, the course was the biggest ever. It was laid out like an urban plaza with two banked wall rides at the top to get your speed and the option of a down-flat-down, 2 down bars, a grass gap, a flat ledge, a creeper rail and a huge wall ride. That’s a lot to take in. There were plenty of highlights throughout the day.

Andrew Brewer’s nollie FS3 over the grass gap and his perfect BS nosepress were pretty high on my list, but apparently didn’t do much for the judges. The judges seemed to be more impressed with flips, which in my opinion have no place in a rail competition. Ryan Paul, the overall winner, won by doing a front flip 50-50 180 out. Which is an impressive trick, but would be more fitting in an arcade style video game than it ever would be in real life. It is also my opinion that he spent quite a long time trying to nail that trick and not enough time really putting down any true rail tricks.

Overall the event was great. The crowd was huge, the riding was really fun to watch and it was a great day in the sun. Big ups to Bear Mountain and the park crew for throwing together the sickest rail jam course ever seen!

 

Results:
1) Ryan Paul
2) Brandon Hobush
3) Jesse Paul

Words & Photos by Andres Quintana

Check the ThirtyTwo cut from the jam, more videos on the way!