Myles Richmond's impressive runs were still only enough for eighth place.
For the first time ever, the Red Bull X-Fighters freestyle tour came to the good ole' USA for what turned out to be one of the most exciting Red Bull contests to date. Over the course of two days, twelve of the best jumpers on earth risked life and limb in the historic Fort Worth stockyards on Dane Herron's monster (no pun intended) of a freestyle course in front of over 20,000 screaming Texans. The funny thing is, I can still here the cowbells in my head when I close my eyes.
Coming into this event, Swiss rider Mat Rebeaud had a job to do: take names and kick but. But he had his work cut out for him, as Jeremy "Twitch" Stenberg wasn't going to let Rebeaud take the win without a fight. The clash of these two titans began two days earlier in practice, where both riders were clearly bringing their A+ game-neither jumper was going to make it easy for the other. Rebeaud's smooth aresenal of flip tricks-even in the pressing wind-looked tough to beat, while Twitch charged the course with his signature smooth style and well-rounded repertoire of huge moves. Several other heavy hitters were also in attendance, including Japan's Taka Higashino, French dude Thomas Pages and Australian distance-king Robbie Maddison, along with Americans Jeremy Lusk, Myles Richmond, Ronnie Renner and Todd Potter.
Tricks like this are what make Mat Rebeaud the man to beat on the X-Fighters tour.
Normally, this is where I would tell you about the qualifiers, but I have to be honest: I went to a rodeo (seriously) and missed more than half of the prelims. But the finals more than made up for it: from the minute that Taka hit the course for the first run of the night, there was magic (and the smell of horse feces) in the air. Each rider threw down their own flurry of flip tricks and huge extensions, and the cowbell-wielding crowd just couldn't get enough. Following the "elimination-style" format for competition, the brackets placed riders against one another to determine the final ranking. When all was said and done, it came down to the two riders that anyone could have predicted: Twitch and Rebeaud.
Stenberg came out of the chute (literally) with an uppercut of a run, making a 115' backflip over the quarter pipe look as sweet as Texas Tea. He followed with trick after trick chucked with flawless extension, but a slight miscue over one of the 80-footers turned a backflip lazy boy into a backlip half-coffin, something that the judges were sure to take into account. Rebeaud capitalized on Twitch's mistake and rode a near perfect two-minutes, matching Jeremy's impressive big flip with a hucker of his own over the 115' gap. In the end, the Twitch was disappointed with himself but still rode like a champion, and Rebeaud won over the judges to take the #1 honors for the weekend.
Thomas Pages threw down at X-Fighters, but couldn't quite get to the podium.
Loud, sell-out crowd? For sure. Awesome riders? Absolutely. With this much success in only their first stateside go-around, here's hoping that Red Bull can make another US X-Fighters event happen in the near future. In the meantime, keep an eye on Dirt Rider and Mini Rider magazine for the full feature story!
Final Result - Red Bull X-Fighters Texas
1. Mat Rebeaud (SUI)
2. Jeremy Stenberg (USA)
3. Jeremy Lusk (USA)
4. Robbie Maddison (AUS)
5. Thomas Pages (FRA)
6. Taka Higashino (JAP))
7. Andre Villa (NOR)
8. Myles Richmond (USA))
9. Chuck Carothers (USA)
10. Charles Pages (FRA))
11. Ronnie Renner (USA))
12. Todd Potter (USA)
For additional information on Red Bull X-Fighters, visit
http://www.redbullxfighters.com.
Jeremy Stenberg was dialed in Texas. | 
Check out Ronnie Renner's height on the quarter-pipe in practice. Nuts! | 
Oh, that Travis! |
Either that is a really lucky lens flare, or this bull is ticked! | | |