A bunch of BMX pros headed to the South of France for the annual FISE contest last week. Mike Spinner got a few photos while on the trip, and we had him kick down a quick report from the trip. Thanks, Mike.
 | Click here to see the photos from the trip. |
Last week I flew from Woodward to Greenville to get picked up by Daniel Dhers late at night. The next morning Dave Mirra, Mike Laird, Daniel Dhers, and myself were off to drive to Raleigh, NC (about 90 miles away) to start our trip to France. Once we got to the airport, our first flight was delayed about two hours. Then finally when we got to Newark for our connection it was too late to board our flight to France, so the plane left and we stayed over night in Newark. We wound up meeting up With Nigel (Sylvester) since he lives around there. The next day we left for France, but once in the plane Daniel realized he lost his wallet, so he was not psyched. He had no money or anything, so I wound up being his bank for the trip (laughs).
During the flight we had a bunch of people saying that we were talking too much, and we had a flight attendant actually tell us to stop talking because we might “wake up the gentleman” in first class—we never stopped, though, but that was weird.
We finally got to France at about 11am their time, and we started riding, which meant Daniel and I stayed up for over 35 hours. When we finally slept we didn’t wake up for like 13 hours. The next day at the FISE contest was just packed with events and a million spectators—it was so nuts. They had a mini ramp spine jam where Daniel ended up in third; he rode awesome. I rode in the flatland contest and I ended up 13th out of 16, and I had a load of fun. I actually put together a run filled with a bunch of nosepick-tailwhip variations I was psyched on (laughs), but I couldn’t compare to the pros. When the park contest happened, I can’t even say how many things went down. It was an awesome contest and I made lots of new friends, including two guys who are amazing: Mark Webb and Ben Wallace. They got first and second place in Mini Ramp and the Park Contest, Daniel got third at both, I got fourth at Park, and Mike Laird got fifth. Dave fell a few times but he gave a 360-backflip-no hander a go and just over-flipped a tad and fell. After the jam I went back out and gave a 1080 a go; I rode about six feet down and then slid out, but I was psyched. That night everybody went out and had a good night. The trip was great, and I can’t wait until next year.
