Joe Sheppard Wins RFDMX Underground Tour!

Well like I said last week, the 2010 Underground Tour hadn’t exactly been going as well as I would have liked it to be, and with just the final round to go I was sitting in third place in the points standings. I was looking forward to the last round at Zac McKenzie’s compound in Gympie though, as I have been there before and it is one of my favourite places to ride.

The course consisted of two main downramps, one with 75 and 85ft comp ramps onto it, and the other with a 75 and a jacked up 50 footer. As well as these there was a tricky little dirt six pack which caused problems for a lot of riders, you had to turn in the air and land the first one perfectly if you were going to get through the rest of the section cleanly.
The format for this round was a little different, we each ran two qualifying heats, the top seven from those moved through to the next round, and then the top three went into the final.

There were a few surprises in the first round, Lance Russell landed his first flip in competition as smooth as a whistle then went and slipped out in the corner after. After wasting a lot of time getting his bike started again, we all thought he would take it easy.... but not Lance he goes and hucks his first ever heel clicker flip to dirt! He came bloody close to landing but washed out and knocked himself out. Unlucky for him as he was riding awesome.

Brad Burch was riding a round of the Underground Tour for the first time in ages, and was ripping the place to shreds with huge flip combos and perfect upright tricks, but he chose not to hit the dirt section, which would come back to haunt him.

I was feeling the best I had in ages and worked out a run I was pretty confident with. I was the only rider tricking through the dirt section and that really payed off as I qualified in first place! It was a bit of a surprise as Burchy well and truly smoked me in outright tricks, but the judges obviously believed that was an important part of the course.
The next couple of rounds were very similar, although more riders attempted the dirt section, which was entertaining at times!

It was meant to be a three rider final, but it was so close the judges decided to change it to four. Luke Saunders, Matt Smith, Brad Burch and I all made it through. Luke went out first and did a killer run, but unfortunately he got a bad case of whiskey throttle in the dirt section and came down pretty hard. Smithy had been riding awesome all day, he was solid as a rock and the only other rider consistently making it all the way through the six-pack, which was enough to get him his first podium finish of the series. Burchy threw out all his bangers on the ramps, but again it was the dirt which hurt him, as he could only do the first jump in the section.

I was feeling pretty nervous, as I knew I had to win to have a chance of winning the series again. I started off with the dirt section and threw a porti-air, dub can and clicker over them, I was pumped as it was the first time I had done the porti off the first hit. The rest of my run went to plan, and all I could do then was wait for the judges to make their decision.

At the end of the day it was Matt Smith third, Brad Burch second and I somehow got myself the win! I felt pretty bad for Burchy as his tricks were insane, but at the same time I think its cool the judges rewarded the technical side of things too.

The points for the win were enough to sneak me past Luke Saunders by just one point, meaning I had managed to win the Underground tour for the second year in

a row! I’m pretty stoked on that, the way the series had been going for me I didn’t think I had much of a chance at all. We all went out and celebrated the night away... maybe a little too hard though in hindsight... You gotta be careful of RBT’s even at eight the next morning!

Cheers
Joe
 

• By Allan H