Look mum – no harness!

It didn’t even look like he was going to get into the final – following an uncharacteristically poor performance by Ricardo Campello in the first round of the Jumping competition, it looked like last year’s champ had not done enough to qualify. But when the points were added up, he’d squeaked through as one of the four finalists.

It was soooo close – Nik Baker nearly got it. With an excellent forward and a great table top it looked really good for him, especially when Ricardo Campello stacked his first jump. But then on his final jump Ricardo produced an awesomely perfect push loop, which meant that Nik had to score 27 or more to retain the lead, and the first Jump title. So he went for it, bigtime. Up up up… round a pushloop, and, er, round again! Yep, almost a double pushloop – but not quite. One and a half doesn’t count. So Ricardo Campello has taken the first jump event, with Nik 2nd and Josh Angulo and Yannick Anton 3rd and 4th.

But a big upset in the women’s jump, where Junko Nagoshi beat both the Moreno twins to take first place! Following a couple of fairly awesome crashes, there was clearly a collective loss of confidence amongst the women. Iballa Moreno crashed into the ramp so hard that she (very luckily) catapulted clear over the top of it, landing harmlessly in the water beyond. Then Nayra Alonso had a bad one too.  But just when it looked like they were all too psyched out to continue, Daida Moreno banged in a perfect forward and the competition was on again. However, Junko was the only competitor to land a full set of clean jumps, with a very nice loop and a table top too. So the Morenos clearly aren’t going to have it all their own way this event!

More news tomorrow as it happens…