By Chelsie Millar

The Beijing China invitational attracted the cream of the crop of vert skaters from around the world. Seven skaters, selected from the end of season 2008 Dew Cup rankings, provided an intense show for the captive Chinese audience.

The brand new 80-foot-wide G Ramp had the field flying. A new element to this ramp was a “bubble” style bridge, over the roll in, which led to some supreme tricks such as Andy Mac's backside crail slides and Pierre-Luc Gagnon’s crooked grind to fakie.

The contest saw the elite group of seven battle it out to start on top for the 2009 season. The list of PL, Andy Mac, Bob Burnquist, Buster Halterman, Renton Millar, Sandro Dias, and Adam Taylor ensured the Chinese crowd an all-star cast.

The intense competition meant that the field were busting out their trump cards. Renton Millar had a solid run in which he crossed the bridge both ways and used the whole 80-feet to nail a kickflip frontside air and a 540 grind--lifting him to fourth overall. Buster banged out a huge McTwist and a stalefish 540 which put him in sixth place behind Bob Burnquist. Sandro was battling knee and luggage injuries and slipped into seventh.

In third place was youngster Adam Taylor, with the consistency of a seasoned veteran, who displayed huge McTwists and an array of flip tricks. Adam's presence is surely making the veterans a little nervous.

PL, one of the most dominant men in vert skating at present, was intense as always as he hucked melon 720s and switch heelflip frontside air reverts. But, after pounding each round, PL settled for second place behind Andy Mac.

In his final run, Andy Mac nailed some insane combos like lien rodeo into nollie heelflip indy before hammering out the cleanest mute 720. He earned a competition-winning 90 points for his efforts.