Martin Soederstroem and Brandon Dosch went BIG IN BAVARIA

Martin Soederstroem and Brandon Dosch went
BIG IN BAVARIA

Munich, Germany, July 27th 2009 – Martin Soederstroem from Sweden won the BIG IN BAVARIA dirt jump competition in mountain bike – Brandon Dosch from the United States did so among the BMX riders. Both showed a whole bag of stunning tricks that brought them not only huge props from the BIKE EXPO visitors, but also each 9.500 US Dollars cash.

The mountain bike and BMX had open practise from Thursday on. But the weather conditions at the BIKE EXPO trade show in Munich didn’t make it easy for the riders: lots of heavy rains and only a few dry sections with many guts of wind made long sessions impossible until Saturday evening.
So the BMX qualifications on Friday had to be cancelled during the first heat. Only finals have been ridden on Saturday evening. The wind was still a bit scary, but the big names in BMX business proofed that they are pros for a reason and coped with this quite difficult situation very well.
Brandon Dosch landed his 720s, opposite 360s, 360 double tailwhips, barspin to tailwhips and various combinations in his final runs perfectly. No question, the Redline team rider deserved the BIG IN BAVARIA title. TJ Ellis showed his backflips as x up one foots and superman variations, fancy cannonballs as well as huge frontflips at the last double: second place for the ruler from the Vans team. The German rookie Simon Moratz from Freising, Germany went off with his 360s, frontflips and backflips no hands. The young gun displaced a lot of the biggest names like Mike Clark, Josh Hult, Josh Stead, or James Foster. All the riders rocked the huge dirt line featuring seven jumps. Mike Clark (4th/USA) was the only one throwing down backflips at the step down. As well as there was only one more rider doing a pretty technical trick on this drop: Darren Berrecloth (5th/CAN), former BMX rider and now primarily known as mountain bike freeride icon, is used to bigger gaps and had the balls to show 360s at this challenging step down.
 
Darren was also the only one, who competed in both categories: BMX and mountain bike. The mountain bike qualifications that were scheduled on Saturday also had to be cancelled because of the bad weather conditions. The riders competed only in one big final on Sunday. But this last day of the BIKE EXPO was pleased with a sunny sky adorned with small clouds all day long. That’s what Bavaria is famous for, so the riders just had to go big. And they did:
 
Benny Korthaus had a bit bad luck during the finals. He was not able to stick one of his 360 tailwhip because he traveled too much to the left side of the landing at the last jump, struggled with the wind and had hang ups at other runs. The Specialized rider would have had some good chances with his huge backflip and 360 table tops on the big dirt line, but at the end he became 7th. Superman tailwhips anyone? Yes! The Czech newcomer Jan Toth impressed the BIKE EXPO visitors and judges especially with this trick that has rarely be seen on a mountain bike before – 6th place at the end for him. Pierre Edouard Ferry unfortunately hurt his shoulder during the last training session, so Yannick Graneri had to represent France in a proper way. Nice no handed backflips, 360 truck drivers and 360 tailwhips secured him the 5th place. The Munich local Amir Kabbani, who has been pretty successful in international contests all over Europe during the current season, got a lot of verbal support from the German fans and therefore was able to jump his favorite tricks like backflip tuck no hands and x up one footers, as well as 360 tailwhips higher than seen in Munich before. The local unfortunately didn’t manage it to get on the podium, because the Top3’s action was just rad.

Darren Berrecloth proofed again that he is one of the most versatile riders. Having placed already 5th in BMX, he gave even more energy into his mountain bike runs. The 360 at the step down marked just the beginning of nice runs packed with tricks like opposite 360 table top one foots or the “bearclaw”-style superseaters. But the Canadian grandmaster had no chance against two young riders from the UK and Sweden. Sam Pilgrim and Martin Soederstroem battled pretty hard for the BIG IN BAVARIA title during the finals. Sam was the man to backflip the step down, as well as to pack his runs with more state of the art tricks: frontflips, backflip no handers and 360 variations. But at the end was it the 19 years old rider from Uppsala in Sweden to win the BIG IN BAVARIA with bar spins and tailwhips at the step down, huge superseaters, double tailwhips, as well as 360 combos with tailwhips, table tops and tuck no handers! Martin definitely went big in Bavaria. So take a look on the results overview, who went how big:

BMX:
1 Brandon Dosch (USA/REDLINE)
2 TJ Ellis (USA/VANS)
3 Simon Moratz (GER/FELT)
4 Mike Clark (USA/REDLINE)
5 Darren Berrecloth (CAN/SPECIALIZED)
6 Dave Dillewaard (AUS/GT)
7 Alejandro Caro (COL/WETHEPEOPLE)
8 Josh Hult (USA/REDLINE)
9 Josh Stead (AUS)
10 Ricardo Laguna (USA/DANS COMP)
11 James Foster (USA/KHE)
12 Dusan Antalik (CZE/NIKE 6.0)
13 Daniel Juchatz (GER/LAFINCA)
14 Cristian Porras (COL)
15 Max Bimar (FRA/VANS)
16 Patrick Guimez (FRA/MONSTER)

MOUNTAIN BIKE:
1 Martin Soederstroem (SWE/NS-BIKES)
2 Sam Pilgrim(GBR/ASHTON DIAMONDBACK)
3 Darren Berrecloth (CAN/SPECIALIZED)
4 Amir Kabbani (GER/CANNONDALE)
5 Yannick Granieri (FRA/GIANT)
6 Jan Toth (CZE/NS-BIKES)
7 Benny Korthaus (GER/SPECIALIZED)
8 Andi Wittman (GER/GIANT)
9 Simon Kirchmann (GER/SCOTT)
10 Tyler McCaul (USA/GT BIKES)
11 Mischa Breitenstein (SUI/KONA)
12 Linus Sjoeholm (SWE/SCOTT)
13 Phil Sundbaum (USA/HARO)
14 Marius Hoppensack (GER/SCOTT)
15 Jakub Vencl (CZE/AGANG)
16 Greg Watts (USA/GARY FISHER)
 
All the guys partied hard at the Munich P1 club, with lots of free drinks and many of hot girls. There were more than a few riders that made their way to the hotel just in time to grab her stuff, take the VW shuttle to the airport and have finally a decent sleep while flying home.
In short: the pros just went big in Bavaria in every way!
Most of them already took care, that their place on the riders’ list of the BIG IN BAVARIA in 2010 is safe. So you can already look forward to next year’s, probably bigger version of the BIG IN BAVARIA.
 
But you don’t have to plan that far to get first class dirt jump action. If you haven’t seen the live stream on www.soulbmx.tv  and www.watch26.tv, look forward for the BIG IN BAVARIA highlight clip coming soon.