Tri-Cities Nolichucky Hometown Throwdown Event #1 Coverage
By wildwildwes • Jun 4th, 2009 • Category: Feature Story, Throwdown Results, WK Hometown Throwdowns
With beautiful weather (80 degree sunny skies) and a near perfect river level / water temp, the first event in the Tri-Cities HTTD series was a great success! Saturday’s (5/30/09) Throwdown was the first organized event of its kind in the Tri-Cities area in over 4 years. Though it was originally planned to be held at Big Rock, because of the medium/high level the decision was made to move the competition. Jaws proved to be the perfect spot for regional paddlers to strut their stuff in front of a crowd of spectators. Fast and juicy, Jaws ate its share of boaters on Saturday with many exhausting rides in the sticky river right pocket. A total of 14 competitors were present for the May event in the Men’s K-1A and K-1B classes.
Good times and big FUN were had by all in attendance with the competitors putting on a great show for the spectators. Spectators on river right had great stadium seating provided by the rock formation on the bank. There is not a bad seat on that rock to watch the competition. We even had several spectators hike down the railroad track from the put-in to watch from the river left bank. It was also nice to see a lot of paddlers on their own river trips stop by to watch the event.
Event Highlights:
*Leland Davis signed-up for his first ever kayak freestyle event in his 20+ years of paddling at event #1 and gave a stout performance! He kicked his style old school sporting an old wooden paddle and a longer than standard playboat. He capped off his final ride with a stylin’ shudder rudder!
*Jason Miller had never even boated on the Noli til the event day and he was brave to compete in a feature had never even surfed!
*Our only swimmer in the event turned out to be the K-1B winner for the event… 
*Three Team Members / Agents from Bliss Stick joined us in the competition. Check out their video of the event with this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIhIULcwuj4
*We thought we had a pro throwdown appearance by the Pro’s pro, HeeHaw Jones, but it just turned out to be Asheville’s World Kayak Ambassador – Justin Benton impersonating him… Good times, good times!!
Tom from the JK factory and Samantha Miller served as our technical judges. The legend himself, Brian Pickett, took a few minutes out of his busy life to honor us by being a scribe with his trophy wife, Natalie, serving as timekeeper. Adam Kamptner of Ripple nose plug fame and Cheryl Killman were the event photographers. Special thanks to Cheryl for the awesome photos we’ve received of the event. Finally, hiding downstream like a traffic cop with a quota, Jennifer Bradley served as boater safety. A BIG THANKS to each of these individuals for all their help! The event would have not been a success without them.
All those who volunteered or competed in the event went home with prizes provided by our awesome sponsors! We would like to thank all our program partners who provided sweet prizes and schwag for the event- check them out in the banner above by clicking on the logo! A special thanks goes out to our local sponsors who provided great prizes for the event as well.
As always… thank you to World Kayak, Colin Kemp, and James McBeath for making these events possible with all their hard work & web hosting!
Location: Nolichucky Gorge, NC – Jaws @ ~2,000 CFS
Tri-Cities Nolichucky Hometown Throwdown Event #1 Results:
Men’s K-1A:
1. Mike Patterson (182)
2. Tommy Hehnen (113)
3. Peter Pickering (106)
4. Leland Davis (80)
4. Adam Bixby (80)
6. Chris Clark (60)
1. Tyson Hoch (61)
2. Steve Moore (54)
2. Brandon Dale (54)
4. Wesley R. Bradley (52)
5. Jason Bordwine (48)
6. Kerry Porche – Hand Paddler (47)
Congrats goes out to the Men’s K-1A (Mike Patterson) & Men’s K-1B (Tyson Hoch) winners of event #1. I would like to personally thank each competitor who came out to participate! There would have not been an event without your participation. I hope each of you had a fun time at Event #1 and will come back to join us on June 27, 2009 for event #2 of the 4 event series!
As you can see we had some great photography from the event! Below are photo album links to all Cheryl’s and my photos from event #1 for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy…
Wesley’s HTTD #1 Photos
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=81648&id=552848204&l=34deb2cf47
Cheryl’s HTTD #1 Photos
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=21921&id=1074133134&l=3289f289e9
If you were not able to participate in event #1… Don’t sweat it! You still have three chances to join us:
Event #2 – June 27, 2009
Event #3 – July 18, 2009
Event #4 – August 29, 2009
Mark your calendars to come out and join in on the fun and prizes. Don’t be shy and miss out! I hope to see you on the Noli for Tri-Cities Nolichucky HTTD Event #2…
wildwildwes is See "My Bio" page on my blog site.
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