WhamBamThankYouJam
Hey! 
So, last week, Jay drove me, Benton and Ryan Meyer to Portland for the Wambamthankyoujam. We drove down in the NSMB Toyota truck and met up with the Go Huck Your Self crew in the Seattle area. We hung around there place, then we hit up the local BMX track for some pump races (no pedaling). Those races were exhausting and made us realize that we are all in horrible shape. Later that evening we went to the skate barn for a little evening session. I had never ridden there so it was lots of fun riding around and figuring out all the different lines. I was amazed how busy it was and made me think that something like that would be possible in Vancouver so people could ride, skate, scooter and so on in the winter. After a few hour session we had all worn our selves out and we were dying of hunger.
Soon after packing up our gear, we took off with Ed, one of the nsmb workers, and his wife for dinner. We decided we would hit up the nearest Denny’s, where one of our many late night gong show meals went down. After that we headed to Ed’s house, where he kindly let us stay, even though we were a bunch of stinky bike riders.
The next morning we set off on the road for the last 2 hours of the drive to Portland. When we arrived the course was still being built, but we all could tell that it was going to be awesome. Once everything got packed in we started to ride and before we knew it Steven Bafus was tailwhiping the 10×10 step down at the start of the course. The riding went on till about 11:00 at night when it finally got shut down. Everyone knew that the next day riders would be throwing down sick runs.
We woke up the next morning after a night of dreaming about riding the jumps we were going to hit the next day. We showed up, after a huge breakfast and the course was all finished and ready to ride. The lay out was a step down out of the bleachers in the stadium, into a 6 pack of dirt jumps, then a curved wall and finally a step up on to a van with a booter off the end. Everyone was squeezing as many practice runs in as they could before the comp started. At about 7:00pm they started the competition with the AM category, the group that I was riding in.
I felt good coming into the competition that day, but just before the comp I ditched the bike on a three and after that my riding turned a bit sketchy. My qualifying runs didn’t work out how I wanted them too and I ending up not qualifying, which sucked, but I was still stoked to watch the rest of the riding. Riders were throwing flips, including Benton’s attempt to flip the step down, three’s and tail whips in the finals which was pretty insane for only being the AM class.
As soon as the pro’s started, riders were throwing flips, three’s and tail whips off the step down as well as truck drivers and 3whips on the jumps. I could go on about all the riders and the sick stuff they were throwing down, but ill keep it to 3 riders who stood out in my opinion. Cam Mccaul, as normal, was throwing down corked flips, dump three’s and three whips all consistently which led him to first place at the comp. Cam was not the only Mccaul killing it at this event, Tyler Mccaul, Cam’s younger brother, was throwing tail whips and opposite tail whips in the same run. He is definitely a rider to watch out for in the future. The final rider who amazed me was Jamie Goldman. He took a super hard crash doing a flip off the step down into a front flip off the first jump. He had to be helped off the course and he looked very hurt. Within 10 minutes he was back at the top of the roll in and did an amazing run, including a back flip off the step down and a bunch of other crazy tricks.
All in all it was an amazing contest to be a part of and I think the event organizers did a great job! I cant wait to attend the next wham bam jam event that is going to be a full on slopestyle comp.
Once again sorry for the long winded write up, and thanks to everyone who made this trip possible and to jay for the photo’s!
Ian.
