Words and photos by Tristan Kennedy
The Wangl Tangl, the annual jam session organised by the Austrian Aesthetiker crew, kicked off with the first practice session today. Riders had descended on Mayrhofen from across Europe to get involved. A Polish crew including Wojtek Pawlusiak put in an appearance, and a strong British contingent made up of the Red Bull UK team (Scott McMorris, James Carr and Jamie Nicholls) and Mayrhofen locals like Will Smith, was flying the flag for the UK scene.
Renowned for their slightly erm left-of-centre take on snowboarding, the Aesthetikers, have cooked up a crazy park set up for the comp, including this wild variation on the ‘Taco’ bowl they created last year. We’re not sure about you but we reckon we’ve counted at least 56 rideable lines on this beast…
The rest of the Vans-sponsored Penken park looked a little more conventional though the option of this monstrous channel gap instead of the first hit adds a couple of extra options.
Blessed with bright sunshine for the early part of the afternoon, the riders attacked the park with a will. The Aesthetikers themselves were looking particularly impressive early on, with Steve Gruber and Rudi Kroll rocking out steewy double shifty BS180s and tweaking the hell out of their grabs. Some of these boys may have been around for a while but they still know how to shred with style!
Later on, a session started on the beast of a bowl at the bottom of the slopestyle course, with Scott McMorris and Jamie Nicholls in particular getting pretty creative with their lines.
With Jamie having landed a couple of his newly learnt double corks earlier in the day, and Scott looking on point, the Redbull UK team certainly look like ones to watch on Friday. That said, I’m sure the local boys will be working hard to keep the Brits from taking the top spot in the team comp. Keep an eye out for our updates coming soon…
