Wenatchee Fest

A little update action from the Wenatchee River Festival last weekend...

Photos are courtesy of Brian at Leavenworth Mountain Sports. Leavenworth Mountain Sports, AW, some other companies and many volunteers put on an awesome event that included all kinds of crazy races and then the real competition: freestyle!

Dan setting up for something Huge while a random dog looks on.

I just thought everyone out there should know that I won. Yup. First place. I got two... count 'em, two... Wenatchee River Festival etched beer glasses. Every time I drink some water out of those glasses, it tastes like victory, too.

We had it up at upper rodeo hole, the turbulent little loop hole that sits about a hundred feet upstream of Rodeo hole. Rodeo hole itself was disappearing as the river dropped, but that brought in the upper hole for a premium level. Not the typical big feature action that you get on the Wenatchee, but it has that exciting little eddy that is really short and presses right up against the rock wall.

The loops were big, the ends were mostly clean, and there were some good back loops too. Not quite enough room or control in the pit for bigger moves like mcnastys, orbitals and tricky woos.

So the end results were:

1. Me (Dan Rubado)
2. Josh Bechtel
3. 'Little Dave' Garringer
4. Taylor Robertson
5. Steve Bailey

There were obviously other things going on too, but I was just there to surf, myself. Drunkards was at a sweet level when I first arrived on Friday and the big aerial wave moves were great. I didn't get any video though, and then the river dropped. But there's still plenty of snow so it could come back!

Paddle hard out there!

-Dan Rubado