(Toronto, ON) July 27, 2008 – Home country favourites Rusty Malinoski and Aaron Rathy charged
through to epic wins over defending champions Phillip Soven and Keith Lidberg in the Wakestock
2008 Expression Session and Rail Championship events respectively. The wins capped an unbelievable
four days of intense action both on and off the water at Wakestock, an event known equally for
its challenging, world leading rails and demanding party schedule.
The hotly contested Wakestock Malibu Expression Session, part of the WWA World Series featured
Malinoski, Soven, Rathy and Andrew Adkison in a four man super final. Malinoski, Soven and
Rathy each stood up strong runs and double-ups making the scoring tight; Malinoski stuck a
Backside 7 off the double-up, while Soven stomped a Toeside 9 and Rathy hit a Heelside 9. The difference
though was Wakestock’s big, technical rail course which played to Malinoski and Rathy’s
strengths. Both posted smooth, impressive slides over the three big 100-foot rails. Malinoski was
able to stay close to Soven with big wake tricks to take the win by a decisive 12.5 point margin,
while Soven nosed out Rathy by 3 points. Andrew Adkison struggled with a fall off the big Double-
Kinked A-Frame rail and was never able to get back into contention. Thailand’s “Bomb”, Jaemjan
Padwat tied for 5th with American Trevor Hansen while Australians Dean Smith and Daniel Watkins
tied for 7th to round out the top eight.
The Wakestock Billabong Railslide Championship featured Aaron Rathy in his second final four
appearance of the weekend, up against rail course destroyer and the three-time defending champion
Keith Lidberg, the hard charging JD Webb and the ultra-smooth Collin Harrington. Lidberg had been
ruling the Wakestock rails all through the preliminary rounds, but in the finals struggled to hold his
slides over the entire length of the big rails. That left the door open for Rathy, Harrington and Webb.
In the end it came down to two-pass consistency on the five rail course which demanded a three foot
ollie onto the 100 foot Roof Top Step-Up rail; Rathy was just that much more consistent than the others
to grab his first ever Wakestock Rail title, followed by Harrington, Webb and Lidberg. Shane
Bonifay and Raphael Derome tied for 5th and Rusty Malinoski and Jimmy Lariche tied for 7th to
round out the top eight.
Wakeskaters had two dedicated events to contest at Wakestock for the first time: the Billabong
Wakeskate boat contest presented by Monster Energy, and the Oakley Wakeskate Pool Jam. The
Billabong Wakekskate four man final featured defending Wakestock champion Brain Grubb up
against Reed Hansen, the 2007 Wakestock champion, Danny Hampson, who is enjoying a strong
come-back year and Stuart Shinn, one of the sport’s rising talents. Despite being the first rider off the
dock, Shinn threw down an incredibly technical run including a wake-to-wake Heelside Shuv-it to
Mute, a wake-to-wake Heelside Late Shuv and wake-to-wake Frontside 360 and a wake-to-wake
Backside Bigspin for the last trick in his run. Hampson, Hansen and Grubb all had falls in their runs
and ended up fourth, third and second respectively.