Detroit – Forty of the best street snowboarders jumped, flipped and slid over bars and walls at Saturday’s Red Bull Heavy Metal event at Hart Plaza.
Athletes traveled from across the country and even internationally to compete in Detroit.
Tara Capilla is from New Jersey and has been snowboarding the streets and parks of New York City. Heavy Metal was the first street competition he participated in after taking up the sport two years ago.
The 21-year-old snowboarder said: “The rush it gives you – like when you hit a trick in the street, it feels so sick.” “The bottom road is definitely…definitely the gentlest. I try to work as hard as I can there.”
The competition was divided into three zones, each with a format that emphasized different snowboarding tricks.
In the first zone, boarders dropped down a snow-covered staircase to gain speed before climbing a 20-foot concrete wall below.
Tricks on the wall ranged from plants, when the snowboarder supports their weight with only their hands, to stalls when standing on the point or nose of their board. Some competitors chose to compete with only one foot strapped to their board to ride over the wall before coming back down.
The second and third zones both contain bars. The fence of the second zone was a “blue groove”, which means that it goes down, flat and down again, and was located between the walls of Hart Plaza. Snowboarders rode the rail backwards, forwards, or both, performing 270 variations, a trick that included a 270-degree turn.
The second zone lower rail was a fan favorite of Stone Van Amerongen, 25, who grew up snowboarding in Wisconsin and now lives in Detroit. He himself likes snowboarding on the street and said that the dangers make it more fun.
“That’s my preference for snowboarding … anything that goes fast, gets big, it’s all very interesting,” Van Amerongen said. “(Zone two) it’s going to have the highest risk, so it’s going to be the highest consequence. So it’s going to be more beneficial for riders and people watching.”
The third area focused on the 50-foot-long railing leading down the steps of the Hart Plaza amphitheater. With most of last week’s snow melted, Red Bull brought snow from Pine Knob Ski Resort to Hart Plaza and has been filling the areas since yesterday.
Saginaw resident Mike Goodrich gave up snowboarding one Saturday to watch the competition. He enjoys snowboarding in the backcountry, but said he would have tried street snowboarding if he had been younger.
“This is the first time I’ve ever competed in a race like this,” said the 36-year-old Goodrich. “I think it’s amazing.”
The sport of street snowboarding started when people started doing street skateboarding tricks on their snowboards about 20 years ago.
Denver Orr, a 23-year-old competitor from Lake Tahoe who started snowboarding on the street five years ago, said, “it’s definitely like a lot of hearts mixed with skaters.”
The Red Bull Heavy Metal race was held for the first time in 2022 in Duluth, Minnesota, and for the first time in 19 years, the winner was Red Bull athlete Benny Milam.
Milam worked with Metro Detroit native and fellow Red Bull athlete Grace Warner to bring the race to Detroit this year. At least 2,000 spectators were expected to attend the event. Competitors and Red Bull have described Hart Plaza as an “iconic packed haven” and a “specific arena” that is perfect for this year’s competition.
“It (Hart Plaza) is perfect. It’s the perfect place for people-watching. Everything we come across is below eye level, below the viewer’s view,” Orr said. “It’s the second time I’ve been in Detroit, but it’s the first time I’ve been jibbing in Detroit, so it’s sick, it’s great.”
Orr said the wall was his favorite event area because it looks like a stadium. The tricks he does in each event depend on what he “feels like in the moment”.
“I have ideas, nothing permanent,” he said.
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