"Heck, yes! Vote for Pedro," yelled Lindsay Jarett as she dropped into the slopestyle course at the Roxy Snow Classic on Sunday, February 20. The event, one of the most highly anticipated Southern California amateur contests of the year, was held at Bear Mountain and attracted rippers from all over the West Coast. Though it was tinged with a competitive nature, Jarett’s quote sums up the underlying element of this contest: fun.

With registration starting at 8 a.m., many riders arrived late due to foggy and partly snowy conditions. This not only caused tough driving on the roads, but also led to poor visibility on the hill. For most of the day, you could hardly see your way down after getting off Big Bear Express (Chair 9). Fortunately, visibility did eventually clear a little on the contest run.

Riders were allowed to slip the course an hour before the first heat. As they mapped out their plans of attack, the Roxy and Bear Mountain staff cheerfully reminded everyone to have a good time and ride well. This year’s course was relatively small compared to 2004’s, with boxes that only required a small ollie, small and medium tabletops, and a quarterpipe at the finish line. One of the first girls out of the gate was 12-year-old Bryn Valaika, who busted a solid 180 on her first jump. Valaika ended up winning first place in the Teenies (12 and younger) division.

Up top, once one person spit out a quote from Napoleon Dynamite, everyone started chiming in. Phrases like "Your mom goes to college," "Can you pull me into town?" and "Duh, I made, like, infinity of those at scout camp" could be heard from the girls as they waited for their numbers to be called.

The best trick of the day went to Kimberly Necochea, who started her run at least 100 feet before everyone else and landed a solid backflip on the first tabletop. Necochea also placed third in the Junior Women division.

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