Check out the China Invitational on NBC from 3:30-5:00 pm EST on June 14.

They may have been on the slow boat but your China Invitational 2009 video coverage is finally here!!! Top Runs, Highlights, Interviews, it's all here for you. Enjoy!

SKATE – PARK

SKATE – VERT

BMX – VERT

Rodolfo Ramos was on today: with a solid first run, even better second run and then trick-after-trick in the jam session Rodolfo came out on top. Austen Seaholm was in second place, with Carlos De Andrade rounding out the top three. Danilo Do Rosario, Chris Mendes and Chad Bartie also made the jam session, finishing 4th, 5th, and 6th respectively. Full re-cap and photos coming soon.

The Alli DewTour China invitational Vert comp is finally here, due to some travel complications our field of 7 was expanded to 8 to ensure we had enough riders in the comp. When it's a comp with such limited numbers it's always better to have one more than one less. I started my day off pretty slow from my crashes yesterday in practice, my body is really sore but I like the ramp and have hopeful thoughts for the first comp of the year. I had a bit of bike maintenance to do right before practice and medical had to do some maintenance on my body too, both jobs were done as best they could with what we each had to work with, ha. Practice felt good and everyone seems to like the new ramp, they were all looking really good in practice.

After it was all said and done Jamie came out on top once again with unbelievable height through his whole run of back to back tricks. Stevie McCann was 2nd place pulling out the always elusive triple whip, being the 3rd rider to ever pull that behind Coco & Zack so that tells you how hard Stevie wanted to take the top spot at this comp. The Brit has the Ausie nipping at his heels for sure. I pulled off the final podium spot pulling some of my usual tricks and only adding one new addition, the one handed X-up flair. Hopefully my run at the Chicago Dew Tour will be more refined and feel better to myself since I'll be in less pain but I'm very happy to have placed as well as I did. Simon Tabron and Jimmy Walker round out the top 5 riding exceptionally well with new tricks out of each of them, it's going to be a good year on the vert ramp. Skate finals were directly following our event and then a lot of us went to have a celebration dinner at a Jazz Club.

Chad
Getting that back wheel straightened out before the final practice session.


The commentary during vert practice was highly amusing from the on air talent of the Dew Tour in the states.... Mr. Bestwick. If you could hear the words that fell out of his mouth for 20 min straight you would understand why Flip is holding his stomach from laughing so hard.

Hard to tell but Stevie McCann is flying through the air blending in with the black background doing a tailwhip lovin the new ramp. Point & Shoot cameras aren't made for indoor action, forgive me for even trying to capture the action but then again this is MY blog so I'll put whatever pics I want on here. ha ha.

Erin from the Dew Tour is assisting me with the autograph session

Time for an interview with the Chinese Sports channel

Here's my view

Right before the Skate comp started I shot Andy Mac on top the top of the roll in and shortly after he stood on the top spot of the podium.

Yeah, dancers on the ramp. At the end of the BMX practice these girls came running onto the bottom of the ramp but didn't pay attention to me being in the air riding the ramp. oops. Came really close to taking a few of them out and I'm pretty sure that me in full pads on a bike would not be hurt as badly as them but they would be dressed nicely even if they were laying on the flat bottom of the ramp.

Podium pic, those trophy's are pretty cool. I think it's a glass microphone but either way it was nice to get a different style trophy.

This spot is near the Jazz Club and it's a screen that plays different scenes on it at night. This night was a phoenix on fire flying back and forth, the area is a shopping center called The Place. Keep It Simple Stupid. ha ha.

Me and a phoenix to finish out the night before we head into he restaurant/club for dinner. Good times in Beijing and no one went to the hospital so it was a successful event for the BMX Vert crew.

Andy Mac was all about consistency today, landing solid runs that culminated in a packed third run that scored 90.00 and helped him to win first in today's contest. After difficulties landing his first two runs, PLG had a clean third run that gave him 88.25 and put him close behind Andy. Adam Taylor came in third. Check back soon for photos and full re-cap.br>
Full Results

1. Andy MacDonald
2. Pierre-Luc Gagnon
3. Adam Taylor
4. Renton Millar
5. Bob Burnquist
6. Buster Halterman
7. Sandro Dias

After throwing down a huge first run, Steven McCann was sitting in a nice first place with 91.83. And with a first-run fall from the master himself, Jamie Bestwick, it looked like he could hold on to that spot.

But in the end, it was Jamie Bestwick's huge airs and jam-packed run that earned a solid 94.17 and the first place spot in the 2009 China Invitational BMX Vert competition. Check back soon for a full re-cap and photos of the competition. And now, it's off to Skate Vert.

Full Results

1. Jamie Bestwick
2. Steven McCann
3. Chad Kagy
4. Simon Tabron
5. Jimmy Walker
6. Dennis McCoy
7. Kevin Robinson
8. Zack Warden

The first day of our tourism trip was great. Started out great, a whole bus full of athletes and dew tour staff meant we were all in for a good day. Plenty of Jokes and laughs, we had quite a tour guide from our local Chinese connection Jack. He's got quite a lot to say and I think we drove him nuts but we all had a lot of fun. This country has so much history in it, it's amazing to see and walk among the culture here. Definitely something well worth the long days traveling. I'm looking forward to another day of new places for me tomorrow.
Chad
Me, Shana, Simon and my sons toy Muno are getting ready for the trip. There's a reason why Muno is with us and maybe you will find out why eventually but maybe later.


Cool scenery

Random street massage for Simon with Stevie right in line for the next session. Cheap, weird and apparently it was really good.

Simon decided he was ready to try and the ladies were more than willing to see if he was naturally talented, as you can see... very stylish.

Chadbreezio made an appearance for a Chinese interview.

Big temple

Nice stache guy.

Skaters were waiting for the next spot for us to walk to.

Crazy statues.

Giant tower with the Olympic Bird Nest behind it. Some of the most obscure architecture I've ever seen.

Inside this big bubble looking building is the Olympic pool where Michael Phelps smoked the competition.

It was time for the competition season to start up with the Dew Tour China Invitational so I got packed up and ready to leave the country. I stopped in Atlanta for a Backyard Bar BQ and then on to Beijing, China. This is the first year for BMX vert to be a full event and I'm excited. After a long winter with tons going on from random travel, lots of riding to a knee surgery; I'm ready for the competition season to start. I've been working on a few new tricks to hopefully give me better chances to move up on the podium but some of them will have to wait for Chicago since I need to fine tune them still. This should be an interesting trip with all the fun tourist trips and the top 7 Dew Tour vert riders from last year.

Chad

I put some new wheels on my bike and dropped about half a pound a few days before leaving on this trip and my bike feels really good.


I spent some quality time making play dough mustaches with my son Tanner the day before I left on my 11 day trip.

This was my view for the 13 hour flight to China from Washinton D.C. Not comfortable to sit or sleep in an airline seat that long.

Decent size airplane but seriously how does it hold enough fuel to not fall out of the sky during the 13 hours in the air?

I pick bags that make life easier at baggage claim... it's a very subtle orange as opposed to the typical black don't you think? And I'm waiting for my bike to show up in my golf bag since I usually get the pleasure of losing one of my bags.

There will now be a field of 8 for BMX Vert at the China Invitational as Kevin Robinson will be competing as well.

Day 2 What's up everyone, Day two in Beijing china! Man Beijing has so much to offer. You just have to be willing to explore. And seeing as i'm jet lagged and wake up at 5am every morning. I'm never short of time.. LOL So after my morning western breakfast, with a dash of china thrown in, I'm off.

First on the list is a VIP tour of the New Woodward Beijing in China by the man himself, Gary Ream. The only words that come to mind on this tour is Awesome! And VIP! There really is anything on site just yet. But a few words from GR (Gary Ream) and your imagination takes over.So by the end of 2009 anybody who has the chance at going, should jump at the chance.

I'm telling you is going to be Amazing!



Next on the list is an indoor snowboarding trip. That's right, snowboarding indoors. While it's hot as hell outside, I'm doing rails and hitting jumps on my snowboard. Well, that is after I took a slam or two and remembered how to board again.

Another cool part about this place was we got to see the best snowboarders in china do there thing. So I took some time to watch how it was really done. I was treated to all kinds of flips, spins and a crash or two. But props to the China Burton team they ruled.




Anyway that's it for day two.

Steve