August 28, 1999

ESPN's B3, bikes, boards and blades, arrived in Beaverton, Oregon this weekend where today more than 11,300 spectators gathered for the professional competition at the Tualatin Hills Parks and Recreation District. After opening day on Thursday, where more than 1500 people attended the event, Friday's attendance drew crowds over 7400, and today brought the city of Beaverton out to the park once again bringing even more spectators. A strong international field stepped up to the awards stand in aggressive in-line skating, bicycle stunt and skateboarding with more finals tomorrow.

Women's In-Line Skating
The in-line skating final brought five women against each other. Fabiola da Silva of Sao Paulo, Brazil, upheld her title as the world's best female in-line skater to take the gold, while Katie Brown of Jacksonville, FL, skated to silver. Michelle Scott of Mississauga, Canada left with the bronze.

Men's In-Line Skating
On the street course today in preliminary competition, Jochen Smuda of Wamgen, Germany, skated a technical and clean run to put him in the lead, followed closely by Portland's own, Aaron Feinberg skating in stylish fashion while Marco Hintze of Ensenada, Mexico is closely behind. In-line street final competition is scheduled for tomorrow.

Bicycle Stunt
In the vert finals, Dave Mirra of Greenville, NC maintained his first place preliminary finish to take the gold once again. Mirra, who earned a gold in the vert competition at the first B3 stop in Oceanside, CA one month ago, was followed by Jamie Bestwick of Heanor, UK and Dennis McCoy of Kansas City, MO. Andrew Faris of Saskatoon, Canada performed a flawless run to take the lead in the flatland preliminaries. He was followed by Michael Steingraber of Hamburg, Germany, Nathan Penonzek of Vancouver, Canada, and Trevor Meyer of Wayzata, MN. Flatland finals are scheduled for tomorrow. The preliminary and final competitions for street will be held tomorrow.

Skateboarding
In the street final today, a strong contingency of athletes proved that anyone can win on any given day. First place went to Dan Pageau of Montreal, Canada followed by an exploding performance from Chad Vogt of Seattle, WA. 3rd place went to Andy Macdonald of San Diego, CA, who finished second in the street and vert competition at ESPN's first B3 stop in Oceanside, CA. Skateboarding vert preliminary and final competition is scheduled for tomorrow.

This weekend, all of the competitions will be held at the Tualatin Parks and Recreation District in Beaverton, OR. B3 includes three sports categories with a total of nine disciplines, including bicycle stunt street, halfpipe and flatland; men's and women's aggressive in-line skating street and halfpipe; and skateboarding street and halfpipe. Competition continues through Sunday. For B3, ESPN and espn2 will combine to televise approximately 29.5 hours of programming, including re-airs, encore presentations and 16 hours of original programming. Athletes at this year's B3 will be aiming to qualify for the 2000 X Games which will be held in San Francisco, CA.