Today the UO Snowboard Club will host the 2008 Cricket Wireless Campus Rail Jam Tour on 14th Avenue and Kincaid Street at 2 p.m.
The UO Snowboard Club coordinators, Benny Robertson, Ryan Lassi and Mike Ortlani, are planning for this stop on the 13-campus tour that culminates in the championship in Portland to be even bigger than last year.
“We’re calling it the P.O.Y., the party of the year,” said Robertson. “We’re gonna get gnar all over the place … We’ve been planning this for months and I’m stoked to see snowboarding on campus.”
According to a press release, the organizers are expecting attendance to “well surpass” last year’s Rail Jam attendance, which reached 4,000.
At a glance
| What: | The UO Snowboard Club hosts the Cricket Wireless Campus Rail Jam Tour, featuring 55 tons of Mount Hood snow, 85 feet of scaffolding and 60 riders |
| When: | Today at 2 p.m. |
| Where: | 14th Avenue and Kincaid Street |
Today around 10 a.m., four dump trucks will deliver 55 tons of fresh snow from Mt. Hood and construction crews will assemble a course with 85 feet of scaffolding. Sixty riders, including about 20 from the University, will rage down the course performing tricks to make it to the finals in Portland.
The tour launched Feb. 7 at the University of Colorado at Boulder, and today it rides at the University for the third to last stop before the finals in Portland on May 23.
“I’m gonna be throwing down some hot moves,” said UO Snowboard Club rider Eric Swenson, who will compete today.
This is the second year in a row the University has hosted a stop on the Rail Jam Tour. Liam Grist, a University student who has been on the tour and goes by DJ Wiky, will be spinning killer beats and there will also be prize promotions.
“They really sold it this year,” said Dan Genco of Galvanic Design, the Portland-based company managing the Rail Jam. “Way bigger set up, 40 feet long, more snow, more sections, way more dialed in.”
Last month the UO Snowboard Club traveled down to Lake Tahoe in Truckee, Calif., to compete in the Red Bull Snow Warz event that brought together teams from 33 universities to see what school was the best on the mountain. Although the team didn’t win the competition, it represented the University of Oregon on the mountain.
Taylor’s will host the Rail Jam after-party for students and the riders who competed.
“We’re calling it A.P.O.Y.,” Robertson said, “the after-party of the year.”
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