Australian Wins Bike Stunt Flatland

Simon O’Brien of Australia won the bike stunt flatland competition held in the parking lot of Staples Center.

O’Brien scored 93.40 points on one of two 90-second runs to defeat Nathan Penonzek of Canada (92.00) and Trevor Meyer of Chaska, Minn. (88.60).

Three-time defending champion Martti Kuoppa of Finland finished 17th out of 20 competitors. The top local finisher was Stephen Cerra of Redondo Beach, who finished eighth.

The flatland competition is a display of balance, agility and patience. If a foot touches the ground in this highly technical discipline, competitors are deducted points. Riders are judged on style, difficulty, originality, creativity, execution and overall performance.

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For the first time, medals in the women’s skateboard park competition were awarded.

Vanessa Torres of Anaheim scored 82.0 points to win the event, which was first demonstrated at the X Games in Philadelphia last summer.

Torres was the only competitor to successfully grind on the asphalt, and she also completed an assortment of other tricks, including a backslide disaster, a backside lip slide, a front side board slide and a kick flip.

“I definitely felt that I had to land my tricks,” she said. “Where last year in the demo I could fall and it didn’t matter as much.”

Lin-Z Adams Hawkins of Cardiff finished second and Amy Caron of San Francisco was third.