Fuse is on this weekend ‘Queens Bday weekend’ in Wellington Micheal Fowler centre. Its been cranking all day!! Basically Fuse is a nation wide talent quest for bands, singers, dancers, dj’s, comedians, artists… what ever! Today was the auditions stage and tonight is the recalls and first big concert. Alot of churches and youth groups travel from around the country for this event!

I have been running the Gyroscope all day with sounds cranking from the van and mountain dew being given away to anyone who can do something crazy or impressive!

Mountain Dew were awesome enough to sponsor the whole event. There are fridges on the stages and mountain Dew being given away after each act. I will have pics up tomorrow hopefully but if you are in Wellington come down and check this event out. If you find me say your saw this and i’ll hook you up with some drinks!

Its finally happened, I just won my first International Pro race!
The course had almost completely dried today except for a couple of the bogs that weren’t drying so the rock section at the top of the course was rediculously fast and the flatter sections below that were a lot easier to get through as well since you weren’t getting pushed off line constantly by the wet rocks.

I did one practice run in the morning which didn’t go too well, about half way down the course I had a really good line that I think I was only one of the people hitting but unfortunately as I went to ride this I missed my timing picking the front wheel up over a rock and had a pretty big over the bars crash, I landed hard on my left hand, left knee and my head (luckily im running a Leatt Brace) which all felt ok at the time but once I was down in the pits my knee and hand starting hurting a lot which ruined my confidence a bit for my race run. Since I had about 6 hours till my race run I went back to condo and got onto icing them which helped a lot but there was still a bit of a nagging pain there.

My race run went pretty well, I knew if I didn’t worry about everyone else and just focused on my own run that I could take the win so once I had got through the more difficult sections near the top I just tried to recover any energy that I could in the open stuff so I didnt blow out closer to the bottom.
I came through the line into 1st place 13 seconds faster than my qualifying time so I was stoked but the fastest qualifyer Aaron Gwin was still on course, watching the time tick by was a bit nerve racking but he had crashed and after a minute I knew it was mine.

Im currently in Boulder, Colorado right now getting ready to fly out to Andorra for the DH world cup next weekend so keep an eye out for updates!

For more blogs check out: http://kieran-bennett.blogspot.com/

Sweet its confirmed, Photo shoot in the Mentawais!!!! On the 6th July I’m flying to Kuala Lumpa then to padang to aboard a boat for at least 10 days, there we will travel around the tropical island locating the sickest surf to get the sickest photos!!! The trip will be covered by Kiwi Surf and Curl magazine!!

A HUGE Thanks to my sponsors Fox and Mountain dew for helping support me on this trip YEEOOW!!!!!

On Saturday myself, Nick Hyne, Tim Pierce and Mad Dawg – the main man behind Snow Park’s Terrain Park Posse all made the mission to Snow Park for Day 1 of filming for ‘NZsnowboard.com Newsweek’. We even got to go RIDE a foot of fresh powder and get some snowmobile tows!!! Seriously…… Check the pics!!

With a big load of fresh falling at the end of last week we had to get up the hill. And with Nick Hyne rolling into town for a day of filming for ‘NZsnowboard.com Newsweek’ we knew we may even be able to get a few sneaky turns in 3 weeks before the hill had even opened….. It was on!!!

We left Wanaka at about midday with a quick stop at the Doughbin for the mandatory coffee and it felt like old times walking into the place with snowboard pants on just like you would on a normal day in the season. The drive up was sweet with snow nearly reaching the bottom of the valley and a cold wet drizzle meaning it was probably snowing up the hill.

Fresh snow in the Snow Park Carpark

To stop any public accessing Snow Park the boys had locked the gate near the top, but lucky for us we were rolling with the infamous Mad Dawg so all was well. We broke through the foot of ungroomed fresh in the mighty Hilux and boosted through to the top car park.

Top To Bottom Coverage at Snow Park NZ

Winter is definately here

Snow Park looked majestic…… covered from top to bottom with a foot of fresh even on the picnic tables outside the Woolshed.. So we got out Tim’s new camera that was worth an arm and a leg and got down to business. I held the cue cards for a bit and Nick Hyne worked his magic in front of the lens. We cranked out the 1st Ep so then it was time for a shred……

‘NZsnowboard.com Newsweek’ Presenter Nick Hyne all smiles!!
Having not ridden in a while me and Nick were both amping and after a quick skidoo tow up to the top we were strapped in and enjoyed an epic 1st run down Snow Parks box run slashing and boosting off any roller we could find. Tim got a few slow-mo shots of a some jumps and pow turns and we finished off hitting this sewage tank jib thing.. Nick killed it …..

Holler ready for his first turns

The footage for all this can be seen THIS FRIDAY at 9am for the Premier Episode of ‘NZsnowboard.com Newsweek’.

- Holler, NZsnowboard.com

The sun is out and the snow is gone! that was the best part about waking up this morning.
I finally got to ride in only one layer of clothing instead of four! Once again the pros had practice with everyone so it was impossible to get a clean run in today, so I did a couple of runs looking at lines then decided to save my energy for qualifying which just finished.
I had a resonable run but it definately wasnt perfect, the altitude is so bad up here so I decided not to try sprinting any of the opens sections and ended up just sitting down and coasting them.
The course is long and physical and I came through the line with a 5.33 which was the fastest time at that point so I was stoked with that but just two riders later I got bumped back into second by Aaron Gwin by around 1 second.
Im happy with my run and I know ive definately got more left tomorrows run so im looking forward to it!

For more blogs check out: http://kieran-bennett.blogspot.com/

Spring in Whistler has been awesome. They managed to push together a nice variety of features for the spring park to keep in fresh and fun. Got real hot last week, there were a couple days of 20 degree heat up on the resort, followed by tons of inbounds avalanches closing most of Blackcomb for a couple of days.

I’ve heard it’s already been snowing a little down south so definitely looking forward for a bit of Snowpark soon.

Here’s a backside 360 video lesson from SnowboardAddiction.com so you guys can start thinking about new tricks for the upcoming season.

Check out the site for more:

Have Fun!

Nev

Just a quick update from the Angel Fire, New Mexico MSC/NMBS race here in the US.
Weve had two days of official DH practice so far and it has been freezing, the top half of the track is covered in snow which makes finding lines pretty difficult. The track is about 50% rocks which really suits me, its rough and technical which is catching a lot of people out. The hardest part about it though is the altitude, i havent managed a full practice yet because its so hard to get used to the limited oxygen.

Ive got DH qualifying tomorrow and then racing on monday so im looking forward to seeing how everything goes.
On Tuesday I fly out to the world cup in Andorra then I have the world cup round in Ft Bill, Scotland then its onto a week training camp in Italy for the world championships with the NZ team so its going to be a very busy couple of months.

For more blogs check out: http://kieran-bennett.blogspot.com/

Sup, not much to report from me but I’ve got one more week in W.A then its home to NZ and down to Qt. The winter swells are starting to roll in here and the temp has dropped hardout, kinda good as I have forgotten how cold it gets in winter. The packing has started and I’m trying to decide what to take and what to leave behind. Its suprising how much you collect over 6-8 months! I hear there has been some snow already so im amped to get there and hit it up. chur.