Allan Cooke didn't need all his runs. The wire-to-wire leader, Cooke used his fourth and final run as a victory lap of sorts en route to the gold medal in Bike Stunt Dirt on Friday.
Cooke, who took fourth place in Philadelphia last year, got over the hump in his fourth career X Games event, thrusting his first into the air on the final kicker. He finished with an average score of 90.47.
The 20-year-old Cooke, the last rider to go, locked up first place after
Ryan Nyquist crashed attempting to pull out a show-stopping 720 look-back. Nyquist (89.53 average) had to settle for the silver.
The bronze went to Pittsburgh's
Chris Doyle.
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| Allan Cooke tailwhipped the competition on his way to first in Bicycle Stunt Dirt. |
T.J. Lavin suffered a couple of hard knocks. The first one, and it was a big one, came when Lavin went for what might have been a gold medal-winning trick - the double backflip. Last year's winner,
Stephen Murray, rode away a winner after he nailed it. But Lavin appeared to land on his head on the fifth and final jump. He remained on the ground for several minutes before getting up to a thunderous ovation at the First Union Center.
Lavin then walked off the arena floor, just out of sight from the fans, and could be heard yelling, 'I'm alright, I'm alright' as he waved his hands over his head. A dazed Lavin insisted on watching the end of the competition but was soon ushered away by a throng of concerned family and friends. He was diagnosed with a concussion and was to be taken to a hospital for further evaluation.
Doyle gave Lavin another lump, a small one compared to his frightening crash, assembling a technically sound final run (91.00) to steal the bronze. It was Doyle's first X Games medal. Lavin had been in third after three runs.
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| T.J. Lavin just moments before ringing his bell in a double backflip attempt. |
The judges and crowd didn't see eye-to-eye, at least in the first couple of runs. Huge cheers didn't mean huge scores. The crowd's exuberance didn't cause these judges to budge. When Nyquist took a backflip into a no-footed can-can finish in the second run, the stingy panel rewarded Nyquist with an 88.20. Cooke even pulled off a superman seat-grab in the same round and scored 89.80. The crowd booed heartily each time. But the judges and fans seemed to be in synch later in the contest. There were six 90-plus scores; Cooke had two.
Cooke set the pace early, landing a no-footed can-can for a 91.20 -- his best score -- in his first run. Cooke was so loose he nearly flew away from his bike.
Brian Foster supercharged the crowd in his final run, launching himself over a huge transfer to claim the competition's highest score (91.40). The 30-year-old Foster credited his racing background.
Related Photos:
BMX Dirt Finals
