BOISE — Skiers and snowboarders showed off their latest tricks to ring in the New Year in front of the Capitol for the Urban Air competition.
“We are out here bringing our sport from the mountains down to the city for the people, showing them what we do and to spread some stoke,” Mason Kennedy, Urban Air event organizer said.
They built an Olympic-sized jump in downtown Boise, one that crews spent four to five days working on.
“We had to truck down a bunch of snow and we also welded up this ramp, got a container down here, and spent a whole day putting snow on all of it," Kennedy said.
At the end of the night, a panel of judges will crown the top three winners, with $1,000 up for grabs, a few pairs of skis, and other swag prizes.
"My goal is just to bring a bunch of fun to the table. I might go upside down, who knows I got a couple of test hits in yesterday, that happened so it just might happen again tonight," Kennedy said. "All these guys are super talented and we just like having fun and sharing it with people."
A group ringing in the New Year doing what they love most while showing off their gnarliest tricks from 360s to backflips.
"It is a ton of fun," Justin 'Juice' Kennedy, one of the competitors said. "We do this whenever there is snow on the ground, so it is pretty normal for us but to be able to have the whole event around us, the potato flying in the air, the fireworks going off, the loud crowd yelling it just brings a whole another level of energy to what we are doing and gets everyone hyped."
They spent the past few days building the jump, and also getting some practice runs in.
"Yesterday was a big test day to make sure that everything worked and was running good, so we just had to tune it up this morning and let these guys start checking it out," Justin said.
"So what's it going to take to win?," I asked him.
“I don’t know we will see, haha," Justin said. "I have a little something right up here (pointing at his sleeve), but I am just trying to have fun and stay safe."
“This whole event is exciting. It is awesome that our little city puts on such a cool event," Mason said. "The Urban Air is my favorite part, there is definitely a lot of excitement going on and I just love sharing stoke with people."
