2007 Toyota Challenge BMX Park

Dhers Tops At BMX Park Prelims

The crowd watching BMX Park Prelims in Salt Lake City was one of the best of the Tour so far; this city knows BMX and is good at getting the riders fired up. That always means a better show with bigger tricks, which is exactly what they got. Zach Gerber got so amped in his second run that he went for a double frontflip, which has never even been attempted in competition. Unfortunately, he came up a little short and crashed, but walked off the course fist-pumping the crowd into a frenzy anyway.

Morgan Wade really knocked the roof off the place with a series of massive gaps. After a crash in his second run, he climbed up top and went for one more, just for the crowd, doing a huge pocket flair gap into the wall ride, easily one of the top two tricks of the day. The other came courtesy of Ryan Guettler, who landed his first-ever 1080 over a box, and did it clean as a whistle. He double backflipped the box in his second run but blew off the pedals on the landing, so look for him to take another shot at that in the Finals.

Also making it to Sunday’s Finals are Daniel Dhers, who qualified first despite badly bruising muscles in his stomach and hip yesterday, Mike Spinner, who did a clean turndown to x-up 720, and Scotty Cranmer, who flair whipped a small quarter and did a no-handed frontflip up the big step-up. Ryan Nyquist did an alley-oop 270 out of the curved wallride, and Kevin Kiraly landed a clean 720

Other highlights include Alistair Whitton's superman backflip, Dennis Enarson's massive flip whips, Dave Dillewaard's tailwhip up the step-up to manual to barspin, Diogo Canina's opposite double tailwhip, and Josh Harrington's big, stylish tables over the step-down hip. Allan Cooke had great flow in his first run, hitting every corner of the course and doing a nothing over the box backwards. It's also worth noting that Steven McCann narrowly missed making the Final for all three disciplines in Salt Lake City, landing only three spots outside of the qualifying twelve in Park.

Tomorrow's Final event is going to get crazy; Nyquist and Cranmer can always be counted on to double the nutball factor for their runs in the Finals, and everyone else will be on their "A" game as well. Everyone thought that the ultra-consistent Dhers had a dent in his armor with the hip injury, but he proved that he can still pour it on when he needs to. Spinner will be looking for another win, and Guettler is as hungry as ever for a first place finish, so kick back and see what happens on the final day of the Toyota Challenge. 

-- From The Dew Tour Website

BMX Park Prelims - Toyota Challenge
Sept. 22, 2007

1st - Dhers, Daniel - 92.83
2nd - Spinner, Mike - 92.5
3rd - Guettler, Ryan - 92.33
4th - Nyquist, Ryan - 91.5
5th - Cranmer, Scotty - 91.5
6th - Kiraly, Kevin - 90.5
7th - Canina, Diogo - 89
8th - Cooke, Allan - 88.5
9th - Whitton, Alistair - 87.5
10th - Enarson, Dennis - 87.5
11th - Dillewaard, Dave - 87
12th - Harrington, Josh - 86.67