Matt Montandon

So I was riding the dirt jumps in Whistler on one of the last Crankworx days when Paul Genovese from Fernie reminded me about the Full Throttle weekend coming up. Next weekend to be exact so I didn’t have much time to get all my traveling sorted out. Luckily my Brother was in Whistler for Trailsworx so I hitched a ride back to my hometown Calgary with him. I hung out in Calgary for the week saw lots of old friends, placed 2nd in a 4x race Wednesday and topped it off with a pool party at my Dads house. Come Friday it was time to drive out to Fernie. I couldn’t be more excited. I love Fernie, good riding, great friends and I got to stay with a very pretty girl with the house to ourselves. Doesn’t get much better than that.

Friday night wasn’t too crazy, just hung out with my girly. Saturday we slept in a bit and then headed into town to test out the jumps. The Wam Bam Jump Jam was the event of the weekend I was mostly looking forward to. When I was riding the jumps in the late morning and early afternoon I felt a little sketchy on them. Not thinking much of it my friends and I headed to Elko just west of Fernie for some rope swinging and cliff jumping at Sliver Springs.

Earlier at the jumps I didn’t have my wallet so I couldn’t register for the jam so I thought I would just wait till later that evening. After swimming we showed up at the jam around 6pm. I learnt quickly that registration was done at 4 pm. I spoke to a few people with radios and got pointed to the Deejay booth. There I found a sweet lady that was kind enough to help me out. After running inside the Aqua Centre a couple times grabbing waivers and profile sheets I was ready to ride.
The riders were split into 15 and under and over 15. The Jam started out on the small jumps with mini contests like biggest whip. Best Table and highest boost, all for cash prizes. I made it into finals for best table and highest boost but didn’t win any cash. Derek V from Fernie and Elijah R from Wasa were killing it and dominated the mini comps with huge boost and more style than Travolta in Grease. As the evening wore on the sky got darker and the lights came on. It was time for the main Jam.
 
  Derek V killing it all night. Getting boosty.
 
This session started off with a huge train to get the spectators out of their seats. Oh and spectators, the park was PACKED! There were people from all over, families and friends. The Jam was run a lot like the Friday Night Lights jam at Goatstyle. If you threw down, a sick line or a banger trick you got cash in your hand. Guys were trying flip whips, double whips and front flips. It was going off. I won 20 bucks for a good line and a 20 for grabbing it out of the DJ’s hand mid air. 720’s had been in the back of my mind for a while. I was sitting at the top of the drop in with Paul Genovese and the DJ was looking for something exciting. Paul said to me “Time to go big, let’s try 7’s.” I dropped first and just styled through the line until the final jump and carved hard and spun even harder. It came around and I stomped it first try!! I couldn’t have been more pumped. Then right after me Paul dropped and stomped his 720 just as hard as mine. Both our first in competition. The Crowd was going crazy.

The one difference between the Friday Night Lights comp and this one was that the Wham Bam Jam had a Super Finals with the 10 best riders of the evening and cash prizes for the top 3. Each rider had 2 runs and I was up first. My first line was 360 the drop in, no-foot to can, back flip to a 360 x-up on the last jump. I was pretty happy with my first run so I could send it a little harder on my second and final run. I 360’d the drop-in to a tuck no-hander into a back flip and another clean 720 on the last jump. It was a run of a lifetime for me. I was ecstatic. But there were still 9 riders to go for their last run. After such a good night it climaxed when I heard my name being called for First Place! Beers being poured on and in me, people picking me up on their shoulders, I felt pretty good! With Derek Vandercek in second place and Paul Genovese in third, the first annual Wham Bam Jam was over.

I had more fun at this Jam than any other comp this year. It couldn’t have happened without all the locals and sponsors. So I would like to thank everyone who helped put this Jam on and thanks to all the people that came out and cheered us on.

The rest of my weekend consisted of beers, campfires, late night hot tubs and shredding the mountain with my buds. Then back to Calgary so I can get a ride back to Whistler for some more bike park action. Thanks Nsmb.

Have you seen Matt slicing ALine or jumping by the river?  Tell us how he’s he filling the AIRprentice shoes here…