Transcendence: Shaun White Triumphant In Dew Tour Return, Wins Portland Skate Vert Event
He’s back.
Oakley’s Shaun “Animal” White returned to the Dew Tour this past weekend in Portland with immense hype and media fanfare. And he definitely didn’t disappoint.
The Olympic Gold Medalist avenged his second place X Games 16 finish to Pierre-Luc Gagnon (PLG) by emerging victorious at the Wendy’s Invitational Skate Vert Finals on Sunday.
In a brilliant performance that likely had some of the 16,000 plus spectators flashing back to the Winter Olympics, Shaun utterly killed it with a barrage of flip tricks, spins and killer combinations that sent the crowd into a frenzy. In a dazzling display, White’s runs included a frontside fakie 540 to fakie 540 cab, to 720. And he ended with the ‘armadillo,’ a frontside heelflip body varial 540: The very trick that hadn’t been seen in a competition before X Games 16, where Shaun busted it out, but finished as the runner-up. It was all enough to land him a big 93.5 score and to top the podium ahead of current Dew Tour Leader PLG and defending Tour Vert Champion Bucky Lasek.
“I always feel I need to perform up to a certain level, no matter who I’m up against,” said White, who is credited with bringing some of his huge snowboard fan base to the Dew Tour. “I want to do my best and I want to win. Guys like Pierre (Gagnon) and Bucky (Lasek) are the ones who make me skate this hard.”
Under pressure to perform due to his immense media exposure compared to other competing skaters, Shaun definitely proved once again why he’s so much bigger than just snowboarding. The result has been an increase in attendance at the tour thus far.
Buzz around the Dew Tour has arguably been growing with the return of Oakley’s star skate team athletes – with Shaun making his way back to the scene and O’s own Ryan Sheckler, who missed most of the tour last year due to injury. Sheckler currently holds an overall second place position in the overall skateboard park standings this year.
“Having Ryan back from injury has given us a big boost and obviously having Shawn compete is huge,” said Chris Prybylo, general manager of the Dew Tour. “The rivalry that is growing between him and Pierre is something a lot of people are eager to see. From a competition standpoint, this has been one of our strongest years in Portland. We got everything we could want this year.”
As if the Portland stop wasn’t getting enough Oakley just from the buzz surrounding Shaun and Sheckler, another one of O’s team stars, Greg Lutzka, snatched the second place spot in the skateboard park finals.
Oakley continues to bring crazy buzz to some of the action sports industries biggest stages…and it’ll only get bigger from here.
Scope out the highlights from the Wendy’s Invitational Skate Vert Finals, courtesy of the Alliance of Action Sports.
Alliance of Action Sports: Dew Tour: Skate Vert Final
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