9th Red Bull Nanshan Open National Qualifier Results
By: Olli Fenwick-Ross | Date: 2011-01-15

Red Bull Nanshan Open Highligts

It was high-fives all round as Xiao Guo was carried to the stage by his fellow competitors after being announced as the top qualified rider in this weekend’s 9th Red Bull Nanshan Open National Qualifier! Saturday saw over 30 riders from all over China take to the Nike 6.0 Nanshan Park on an unseasonably cold and windy day to battle it out for the remaining five Local Rider spots in the 9th Red Bull Nanshan Open, a 4Star Swatch Ticket To Ride World Snowboard Tour competition.

Red Bull Nanshan Recap

With the best run of three counting, riders were unleashing everything they could and given the windy conditions the first kicker would be the make or break for most of the rider’s runs. Xiao Guo earned first place on his second of the three runs, throwing a huge floaty BS360 mute on the first kicker followed by a corked BS540 crail on the second kicker, finished off with a switch boardslide to regular on the rainbow box and a frontside tailbonk on the post.

Scoring consistently well on all of his runs, 28 year-old Zhang Wei deservedly earned his spot in the rankings with a FS540 on the first kicker, a switch FS180 mute on the second, followed by a boardslide over the rainbow box and a stylish method off the post feature for a second place finish. Wowing both crowd and judges, American rider Nate's perfect BS720 and boned out FS360s off the kickers and rock-to-fakies on the wallride earned him third place in the rankings. Ming Ming, Huang Chao, and Wang Lei would grab the last three remaining spots with some solid runs through the park. They join local rider Xiao Hu on the list of Chinese riders participating in the main event; Xiao Hu earned his wildcard entry at the 6Star Oakley Air & Style in Beijing late last year.

With the 9th Red Bull Nanshan Open riders list now complete, the local riders will be spending the next week shredding the park, ensuring their tricks are up to par come the big event next weekend.

For more info on the 9th Red Bull Nanshan Open and the photo gallery from today’s event, check www.mellowparks.cn