Red Bull Wake Open
 

Just watched everyone practicing on the course in the channel outside my hotel in Tampa. Pretty cool setup with two System 2.0 towers running side by side. Red Bull is doing it up! Big Air starts in 15 minutes and the cable comp will be live on NBC tomorrow at 1:00 ET.

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Looks awesome! Can't wait to watch it!

And its pouring rain in n tampa right now with lightning.

Oh and wht happened to Adam Errington? He get hurt earlier today?

Keep postin pics for those of us stuck in the damn office. And have a drink & sushi roll at Jackson's for me...

Haha..theyre havig some big party with female dancers at jacksons tonight. Just sayin

Are they only televising the cable portion? Looks sick either way!

Not 100% but this preview makes me think they'll show portions of all three events. Anyone else know?

<iframe src="http://player.vimeo.com/video/45406020" width="900" height="506" frameborder="0" webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen></iframe> <p><a href="http://vimeo.com/45406020">Red Bull Wake Open Preview</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/wakeworld">WakeWorld</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com">Vimeo</a>.</p>

DAMN!
Orlando feels so far away right now...

They will be showing portions of all 3 events today on W NNNNNNNNNNN BC.

I wish they let a few of the McCormicks locals into the comp. Proses, Dickey and Chandler would have definitely held their own out there

Thought Daniel Grants rewind 5 was better than the two doubles

daniel grant's front 5 to stale to rewind back 180 was bad ass!

Any chance of seeing this if we missed it? Anyone know if it'll be online or if they'll replay it?

Daniel Grant should have won the big air for sure

i second that replay comment^^

I just watched this a bit ago and got on here to see if anyone had posted about it.

I know that at this point ANY wake coverage is better than nothing but I think this thing completely missed the boat (no pun intended) of actually capturing wakeboarding OR increasing chances that networks will try to put wakeboarding back on TV.

I'm not going to make a long post saying I have a magic solution. I don't want to assume that everyone feels the same way I do either.

I just would have rather they actually try to catch the environment for wake that we all really experience. These attempts at throwing the scene in the middle of a big city as if it will make boarding seem more "relevant" I think go the opposite way.

I give tons of props to red bull for investing in our sport but there are tons of other ways I'd like to see our sport on TV (heck I'd rather see TV coverage that takes place on the home lakes of any of the guys we regularly admire on here).

I pretty much agree with luke. I mean any coverage for this sport is totally awesome, but I was really disappointed that there was very minimal boat coverage. I mean I guess I understand, that red bull needed to have there name on everything for advertisement reasons and being out in the quarry would have made it hard for advertising. Spectactors were probably limited in the quarry as well as you could there was pretty much no one there except riders and a few friends probably. The average American public loves watching big air for any sport and loves watching BMX/Skateboard park so NBC and Redbull probably felt that mostly showing park and big air would bring the best ratings.

Overall, its progression for the sport. Its a huge deal to be put on NBC and to have such a top quality event put on. Great riding, sick tricks and it puts us more in the spot light.

^^^ I completely agree. While I think it is great the wakeboarding got a 2hr spot on NBC, it's a shame that the boat competition only got about 5min of coverage. The cable portion looked slow and in my opinion, the obstacles were not very impressive for cable. The general public who watched that maybe for the first time was probably not impressed or wow'd either with the exception of the kicker.

I'm sure it was very difficult to set up that temporary cable course but the general public probably doesn't understand that. They just basically saw the same 4 riders hitting an obstacle, then slowly riding up a half pipe, hitting another obstacle, then hitting a ramp.

I think for the TV audience, the boat portion would have been far more exciting. It seems like Malibu would have really pushed to get more of the boat portion shown. I can't imagine they are happy with the final product. They could have easily shown at least the best ride from each rider per heat to show how the final 4 advanced.

Overall though, I do think wakeboarding was shown in a positive light. I just don't think it was shown in its best light: in a true cable park for the cable portion (far more exciting and challenging), big air off a kicker being pulled by a boat (or a double up contest instead) and more of the boat portion.

I completely agree with everyone above. I was totally underwhelmed by the contest. The boat section was totally lame. You can see better riding at any pro tour stop. Also, the cable looked slow and the obstacles were nowhere near as good as wake the line, wake of fame, or wake lab. It's great we are getting exposure, but honestly it didn't feel like wakeboarding to me. You know the feeling you get when you open up alliance or transworld for the first time. The industry has a certain vibe and I didn't feel it was represented well here. Felt far to corporate.

Ur wakeboarding behind boat exposure will come with wakebros in 2 weeks lol

I was there, there was a lot of down time at least today there was. I didnt get to see any of the broadcast. There was alot to do for the those in attendance and was a pretty decent turnout, not flugtag turnout like last yr but still reletively good. I spent time in the hospitality area, by the riders platform and out on the water. The water was where the fun was. Boat parties....

the announcing was so brutal. my god get a few people that are up to speed with where wakeboarding is at. this isnt the 1996 protour.... give these guys retirement papers.

Little off topic but hopefully Directv and Viacom will get over their pisssing contest and work things out. I have been waiting all summer for Wake Brothers and now it looks like I am not going to catch it

As far as the Wake Open. Any coverage is good. If the ratings were there then the network will notice. It is all about how much money they can make.

Yeah announcing was trying to make more out of it then they knew how. Parks helped out on technical stuff. If Sal was more up to date on the sport he would've been a better choice to call the thing or the Dan-O would've been great as we all know. Overall the Park stuff looked good but I loved the slowmo shots of the boat when the chopper was behind them filming too. Oh well NBC is our new fuel(mma)tv and it's better than nothing.

One thing I have learned from performing when I use to do FMX is that Americans love speed and danger or your ratings will suck. When I use to do the Monster Jam tours some of the most technical tricks didn't seem impressive to the untrained eye so we were told to do more exciting tricks. All of that transferred into wakeboarding on national tv would equal riders behind a boat. The speed is faster, the noise is louder because of the boat etc.... Being Redbulls first event like this, i am positive they will sort out all of the details. However, I don't see the final result being impressive to most riders, it needs to be impressive to the average spectator

I thought, "What do I care if they take MTV. I don't watch it anyway." Your post just reminded me of Wake Brothers... Crud.... :banghead:

Pics from Boat portion: (Please keep in mind I have no idea how to work camera except to push the button to take the picture)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jaybeednb/

That was the only thing on the MTV that I would have watched. Like i said i have been looking forward to it and now nothing. I heard taht Viacom also blocked the content online to for the war with Directv to continue. I have not tried to watch anything from MTV or another channel so i am not sure if that is true or not.

Parks double or nothing from last year on fuel was far more exciting than watching 3 guys all do the same double roll over and over. It's an impressive move, but I thought the rewind tricks were way sicker.

UPDATE- yesterday i after i watched the open (and posted above) i went to amazon and bought the instant download of Defy (what can i say...i had a hole to fill from all my excitement built up).

what a GREAT movie! wish i had bought it a long time ago. that movie took me back to the good ol day feel and really got me pumped. in fact, i am considering doing a old fashioned houseboat rental for labor day because of it if i can.

the reason im posting this is to add this to my previous post:
we need movies like Defy hosted on HBO or played to death on a similar network. this is the coverage the sport deserves. i hope we gt there.

Saw your X2 on Friday. I love the pictures of the bow of the MX. No weight up there at all!!!

I noticed that too... What extra weight? You mean they don't all sit this low?

<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jaybeednb/7574794804/" title="DSC_1684 by JaybeeDNB, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8283/7574794804_11c8fd1290.jpg" width="500" height="334" alt="DSC_1684"></a>

thought that not showing much of the boat portion was the way to go. A total newb watching this on tv could realize; hey I could get into this sport by buying a board and checkin out my local cable!!! Where as with the boat contest the newb would think that they had to have an 80,000 dollar boat to get into our sport. Just sayin....

Anymore weight and that Malibu is gonna need a periscope!!!

i really think they dropped the ball on the boat portion. it was like they put it in there just to say they had a boat contest. this sport is more exciting to watch from behind a boat, the cable stuff is cool and will make the sport grow but it put everyone to sleep that was watching it with me. Noone really stepped up and did anything unheard of, double flips are cool unless everyone is doing them, and the quarter pipe stuff looks lame. DG changed it up but i guess the judges didnt care. all in all it was great for the sport but it was kinda boring to watch and i love watching wakeboarding, people checking it out for the first time were probably not real impressed.

If you happen to live near a cable... many of us don't. Cable is not the magic answer to making the sport accessible to everyone when there's only a handful of cables in the whole country and 75% of them are in Dallas and Florida. So I would guess something like 99% of the population of the U.S. lives more than 3 hours away from a cable.

The closest full size cable to where I live is six hours away. Yet I ride cable at least three times a year. Just sayin.

And have so much more fun than behind the boat but we are just getting into opinions now.

You should have come said wassup, unless you were on land. If you ever wanna come out and ride just PM me. I go out a few times a week, but I think you live on a private lake so think you are good there. Either way we should link up as it seems Tampa is divided between those on a private lake (who really don't have any reason to ride any where else) and those of us who are not that lucky :)

Only a handful of cables YET. See how fast they pop up now. Look at Europe; Germany and the Netherlands have cables everywhere! Germany is one of the biggest markets for wakeboards worldwide. I'm sure that in a couple years there's tons of cables in the US. Cables are what is making the sport accessible to (almost) everyone. I like boat better but really like what cableparks and System 2.0's mean for the sport.