The Adventure House Counsel from the Bader-Snyder complex has rented out Chapman Hill again this year for the Fourth Annual Throwback Throwdown Rail Jam.
Get down there in your best 80s theme attire this Friday, February 13, to jam out with the MXT RedBull truck DJs and all the Adventure House folks, said Ryan Reggans, founding member of the throwback event and chairperson on the Adventure House Council.
This year, one of the main goals is to bring a fun, friendly environment into the community, that offers a secure place for participants to enjoy some sick turns and dope tricks, Davis Hoyt, Adventure House council member, said.
Competitors need to show up at 4:00 p.m. for some practice runs before the actual competition starts at 5:30 p.m. Spectators should show up around that time too, he said.
There is a $15 fee that gets you entry into the competition and a t-shirt, Lisa Ivester, event coordinator and OP intern, said.
The event is open to all, with only 25 of the 50 competitor slots filled, so prospective rail-jammers should sign up in the OP office or in the student union at the OP table, she said.
The grand prize this year is a Cat-ski trip with San Juan Untracked, Reggans said.
There will be a ton of great prizes this year for the male and female winners, as well as prizes for various other things like best crash, best costume, best spectator, Ivester said.
The lower level prizes include things like Osprey packs, Ski Barn helmets, goggles from Zeal, with t-shirts and various other prizes through the Shane McConkey foundation and local vendor support, she said.
This time around we are expecting much better snow conditions than last year, and the folks down at Chapman have been working hard to add steez and flare with setting up the course, she said.
The Adventure House makes a profit from the event and that profit goes back into the program to support future activities including the following years throwdowns, Hoyt said.
The event is no small task, so far its been a $20,000 investment this year alone. But it will all be worth it, because the “stoke factor” is high this year and the event is constantly growing, he said.
Reggans, and two other founding members of the Throwback event, Fletcher Ouren and Davis Hoyt, are pushing for a larger community impact, Reggans said.
They would like to start a fund that will take event-generated revenue to fund a “dream trip” for some deserving person, by way of an application process, he said. “The idea is to send someone on the trip of a lifetime who would otherwise not be able to afford it."