What do White Snake and the Beehive State have in common? Big hair, raucous sounds, and head-banging: Hordes of frenzied snowboarding fans flocked to steps of the Salt Lake City, Utah's Delta Center, home of the Utah Jazz, to witness the final Red Bull Heavy Metal rail-sliding spectacular on May 15, 2004. The Heavy Metal has been on tour for three years, but Big Bear, California's Hana Beaman was the only woman ever to compete (Portland, 2003) until this year's SLC event. "This year, we invited a larger group of girls," says Red Bull Media Relations Manager Josh Kendrick. "To be honest, it's a pretty brutal sport, and I think many [riders], both men and women, are a little reluctant to do it." But five women -- Beaman, Alexis Waite, Susie Davis, Laura Hadar, and Erin Comstock -- showed up and proved their mettle on Saturday, making the Heavy Metal's grand finale even more tremendous.

The Red Bull Heavy Metal is a best-trick contest; riders session two different Zones, with a winner emerging from each section at the end of the night. Zone 1 this year consisted of two crescent rails and a straight rail. SLC's own Erin Comstock soon rode to center stage with a perfect frontside boardslide on the straight rail. Alexis Waite, of Kirkland, Washington, stepped to the mic as the first woman to attempt the crescent rails. When the cacophonous sounds of the session subsided, however, it was hometown queen Comstock who took the Zone 1 title and the $1,000 prize. "I haven't slid a rail since Shannon Dunn's P!Jamma Party [in Lake Tahoe, California, this April]," Comstock confessed, "but I slid a 50-50 first try, felt warmed up, and just had a lot of fun."

After a short set break, the maidens of metal quickly stole the show from the men in Zone 2. This section contained a straight rail, a two-tier down-kink rail, and a 14-foot gap to straight rail. Canadian Susie Davis immediately nailed the kinked rail, while many of the guys struggled. Laura Hadar, of nearby Park City, Utah, upstaged Davis by repetitively cleaning the gap rail. She was the only woman to attempt it, and her airtime won her the Zone 2 honors as well as a check for a grand. "The gap looked sketchy when you're close to it, but from the top, it's not that bad," the winner commented. "I like rails and jams because you can just go for broke."

Slopestyle dynamo Hana Beaman sat out most of the contest with a nagging right-ankle injury. "It's been injured for a while. I have lots of scar tissue, and it gets stiff," she said of being benched. "It just started hurting again a few days ago." She slid the straight rail in Zone 2 a few times, but opted to let her ankle recover.