The Last thing on your mind might be snowboarding when it comes to spending a sunny fall day in Denver. For some it might be rodeos, drinking beer, and watching football, for others skating Denver Skate Park, or taking the dog for a walk, but Saturday was anything but that. Salomon, Redbull, The Art Institute Denver, Ink Monster, and SNOWBOARD Magazine all teamed up to put on the first Back Yard Bang and after party in Denver. Boots were laced up, snow was trucked into downtown, a forty foot high scaffolding was set up and people began to pack the street anxiously to watch the mile high grinding spectacle.

To random passers-by it must have seemed quite out of place. 12th St. was packed with snowbros, tiny bopping tank top rocking teenagers, parents, friends and little kids jumping all over the place. The Salomon Team showed up in their RV, Red Bull girls were wandering about, The Art Institute built a custom jib and provided us all with sandwiches and coffee. Added all up, it was quite a day of fun in the sun shreddin’. The snowboarding started and right off the bat kids were going for it. I was almost scared to watch as there were some pretty close calls and started to think kids were going to kill themselves, but as riders settled into the grove, some pretty impressive snowboarding went down. Third place for the girls was Izzy LaLive, good to see you. Melissa Kelly took second, and Claire Hewitt DeMeyer charged it into first, taking more spills than anyone I saw all day in her attempts to finally take home the $1000 cash prize.

For the men, taking third with some pretty cool change up tricks was Derek Summering, Eric Van Assche took second with some good clean style, and taking the cake and $2000 smackers was Forest Bailey. That kid is one impressive rider and was throwing consistent back-to-back bangers all day. Keep your eyes peeled for this kid! After the contest it was drinks at The Church, the Salomon crew headed over to D-Park for a skate sesh, and everyone reconvened at City Hall for a banging after party. I won’t say too much, but bottles of sake were being passed around, babes were in abundance dancing to the sounds of DJ Ear Attent and the Educated Figures. Whygee came out rhymes-a-blazin’ along with Sunkenstate and brikAbrak on the tables. Kids were breakdancing and even Louif (Paradis), Bode (Merril), Scotty (Arnold), and Jed (Anderson) brought their dancing shoes.

Thanks to Rian Rhoe and Matty Alberts at Salomon for making it all happen. And April at City Hall, the Ink Monster Boys, and Red Bull Snowboarding for all making it happen.

Words: Kealan Shilling
Photos: Matt Alberts, Kelly Robertson, and Kealan Shilling

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