Words: Taylor Murray

Photos: Darcy Bacha

For the full photo gallery click HERE!

The Arizona desert is a weird place. Maybe it’s the 700 year-old cacti, the awkward co-existence of frat boys and gypsies, or the fact that it just snowed more in Flagstaff than anywhere else in the country. Regardless, the crew from the Campus Rail Jam Tour was stoked to explore Tucson and feed their appetite for the bizarre.

With an amazing debut in Tucson last February, the Tour is no stranger to the University of Arizona. The crew was welcomed with open arms as they skated through campus spreading the stoke and making friends with every attractive girl to walk by. Tucson may not be the breeding ground for the next LNP or Tom Wallisch, but the locals sure do love snow. That being said, the crew was psyched to add their own blend of bizarre to the desert and swap sand for snow in the middle of campus.

If there’s one thing learned from last year, it’s that Arizona locals love to skate. So when students walked out from classes to the sight of snow and a brand new mini ramp, it was like Christmas came early to the UA campus.

When the event kicked off at noon, classrooms must have been emptier than a box of doughnuts in a cop car, because over 3,000 kids were on-site enjoying the snow and skate. The UA students must have liked what they saw last year, because over two times as many people applied to ride in the contest. Not bad for a place where most people have never even seen snow! Snow-hungry co-eds flooded the sponsor booths, making custom t-shirts at the Cricket Wireless tent, and entering to win the FordDrivesU Ultimate Snowboard Getaway.

Only two female snowboarders came out to play in the big snowcone pile, and both walked away with more product than they could carry! Kristin Swanson was all smiles and took home second place along with a limited edition snowboard from Ford. Tour veteran, Emily Astiz started things off with mellow slides on the rainbox-down box but soon started eyeballing the 10-foot gap box. With the crowd roaring, Emily flawlessly floated the gap and powered through the box. Needless to say, Emily landed in first place with and new banana traction board from Roxy snowboards.

Emily pushes over the rainbow

(L-R) 1st place – Emily Astiz, 2nd place – Kristin Swanson

For many of the male shreds, the three rails on the new setup were bigger than anything they’ve hit all season. However size didn’t seem to concern the AZ rippers as they attempted to pull out everything in their bag of tricks to impress the judges. Colin Ofloy went into the finals dropping hammers with 270s and 360s onto the gap box. Judges awarded Colin third place and a full kit from Bonfire Outerwear. Second place went to Tempe local, Loren Brinton for his proper 5-0s and frontboards on the kink. At the end of the day it was David Biner in first for his buttery combos and smooth style. David slayed all three rails and was hooked up with a new board from Salomon Snowboards for his effort.

270 to frontboard by Loren Brinton

(L-R) 2nd place – Loren Brinton, 1st place – David Biner (3rd place – Colin Ofloy not pictured)

Skier Alex Gaynor came out on top for the two plankers and walked away with a fresh pair of Coreupt Skis after throwing down stylie 270s on the gap box . Andrew Salter followed closely in second and was rewarded for his efforts with some sick new Bonfire Outerwear. Last year’s winner, Nate Johnson rounded out the pack in third scooping up the Neff x CRJT collabo hat and some other goodies.

pushing two planks through two kinks

(L-R) 2nd place – Andrew Salter, 1st place – Alex Gaynor, 3rd place – Nate Johnson

With the first event in the books, the Galvanic crew packed up the semi, waved goodbye to new amigos and is headed towards Tempe for the second event of the Campus Rail Jam Tour to take place at Arizona State University. The rail jam will be the main attraction of “Devilpalooza” this Friday the 19th. Be sure to hit up www.campusrailjamtour.com to apply to ride and for more info on the tour.