Aerial skiing Olympic Champion Lydia Lassila’s much-anticipated comeback continued impressively at Lake Placid in the United States today when she pocketed her third World Cup podium finish from four starts.

The Australian Institute of Sport / Victorian Institute of sport athlete ended night two of the Lake Placid double-header in the silver medal position, adding to second places in China and Canada in the opening two events of the season.

Fellow AIS / VIS scholarship holder David Morris, who captured a career-first podium finish yesterday, also continued his successful season.

Morris backed up his third place yesterday by qualifying for his third super final in the four rounds of World Cup so far.

Morris leaves Lake Placid with a third and a fourth added to his record, clearly the best two days of his career.

As well as picking up her 32nd World Cup podium, Lassila can be pleased with several important steps forward in her quest for a tilt at another medal at the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympic Games.

This weekend saw Lassila jump triple somersaults in competition for the first time since the Olympic final in 2010.

Chinese athlete, Yu Yang, won today’s event, with compatriot Mengtao Xu third.

Fellow AIS / VIS skier Laura Peel is getting back to her best after a delayed pre-season start.

The 23-year-old Mount Buller-based skier finished Lake Placid in sixth and was today’s top qualifier.

AIS / VIS scholarship holder and world number five Dani Scott was ninth and was the third Australian woman to finish in today’s top 10.

The other two members of the AIS / VIS aerial squad, Renee McElduff and Samantha Wells, came 12th and 17th respectively, after very good jumps in the qualification round.

Lassila said she believes her return to competition is on track and living up to her expectations.

“Today I felt I had more fun. It’s been a while but it is coming back,” Lassila said.

“I’m very happy with how things are progressing and we could not have asked for more.

“We wanted to do the first couple of events with doubles and they were successful, then we added triples, which is what we did this week.

“It’s a really good start. The jumps are nice. I just need to get the landings a little more consistent.”

Lassila’s landing in the super final was the difference between winning and second today, with Yu Yang being the only competitor in the four woman super final to successfully complete her landing in the blustering conditions.

“It was strange because the conditions changed a lot for the final,” Lassila said.

“We were taking steps up on the in-run down. We were all over the place but we got the speeds right.

“Also through the course of the day, and I wasn’t ready for this, the landing hill was super soft and I just sank in. I couldn’t save it.

“Three girls crashed in the final as a result. We didn’t expect the landing hill to get that soft from one jump to another.”

Morris said he was really “happy and disappointed at the same time” with his fourth place and the fact that he missed his second podium in as many days by the small margin of 1.57 points.

“Today I probably set my expectation of myself a little higher than yesterday,” Morris said.

Comeback skier David Morris delivered the best performance of his career to become the first Australian men’s aerial skier to win a World Cup medal in almost 15 years at Lake Placid, in the United States.

The 28-year-old Australian Institute of Sport / Victorian Institute of Sport athlete, who came close to walking away from aerial skiing 12 months ago, achieved a life-long dream of becoming the first Aussie male to reach a World Cup podium since Jono Sweet finished third at Whistler-Blackcomb, Canada, one week short of 15 years ago.

Morris’ third place elevates his world ranking to number three and comes just six days after he achieved a then World Cup career best result of fourth at Val Saint Come, Canada.

Today’s World Cup third round saw Chinese athletes fill the first two places with Zongyang Jia and Guangpu Qi taking out first and second. Morris’ bronze medal denied the Chinese team a 1-2-3 finish.

While all eyes were on the Australian women, particularly current Olympic gold medallist Lydia Lassila, Morris stole the limelight.

Three Australian women qualified for the round of 12, however, none scored high enough to progress to the super-final for the top four athletes.

The best of the Australian women was 22-year-old AIS / VIS scholarship holder Dani Scott, who finished with a career equaling best fifth place after topping the leaders’ board in qualifying.

Fellow AIS / VIS athletes Lydia Lassila and Laura Peel finished 11th and 12th respectively, after both missing their landings in the round of 12.

Morris described the result as the “best day of his life.”

“I didn’t dream that I would ever be standing on a World Cup podium,” an elated Morris said soon after the completion of the night event.

“I did a quad triple triple (in the round of 12) and it was massive and I pinned the landing. I was celebrating that one because I had redeemed myself on the spot.

“When we looked at who was in the super final, we realised there were three Chinese guys. The only jump I had left was the full, full, full, which would have given me a fourth against those guys.

“So at that point I decided to do my first double full, full, full for the season.”

“When I landed it, I felt like hugging everyone, which is what I probably did by the end of the day.”

Ironically, Sweet, the last Australian male aerial skier to stand on a World Cup podium, was Morris’ first coach and the person who enticed him into the sport.

Morris admitted that 12 months ago he came close to quitting the sport that has been the centre of his life for so long.

He said that watching aerial events on TV prompted him to strap the skis on again this season.

“When I saw some of the results, I thought that could be me so I decided then to compete again.”

Morris has no time for celebrations as the next World Cup aerial competition will be held at Lake Placid in 24 hours.

Australia’s six member aerial skiing squad were all smiles after their World Cup performances at Val Saint Come, Canada, today when Olympic Champion Lydia Lassila made it two podiums from as many starts and AIS/ VIS team mate Laura Peel qualified for her first super-final of the season.

To add more gloss to the day, Australian aerial skiers dominated the top five places with Dani Scott achieving a personal best fifth place and narrowly missing the super final.

The results in Quebec were part of Australia’s best 24 hours in World Cup history, highlighted by two wins and three other podium finishes across three skiing and snowboarding disciplines.

Lassila described her result as “brilliant” despite the fact that she was “out jumped” by China’s Mengtao Xu.

The Australian hastens to add that she is yet to reintroduce triple somersaults into her competition regime, electing so far to stick to multiple twisting double somersaults with high executions, at this phase of her comeback.

However, she plans to reinstate triples when she competes at Lake Placid, USA, on January 20.

“Our plan is to do the triples this week which is exciting,” she said.

“I’m hoping they will go well although I’m not sure what to expect in terms of results and lasting a whole competition doing them.

“I’ve taken it one step at a time but we’re ready now.

“I have performed really well and consistently in the two events, executed the tricks exactly how I wanted so I’m pleased with that as a platform and now I can keep building.”

Peel, who finished last year with a ranking of four in the world, recaptured close to her best form with an excellent fourth place today executing both double somersaults almost perfectly.

Fifth place Scott, again had very high points on her full full, and has moved to third on the World Cup rankings behind Lassila and series leader Mengtao, while Peel has climbed up into sixth.

Renee McElduff also qualified for finals competition in 12th with a well executed lay full and Samantha Wells narrowly missed her full full landing ending up in 14th place.

The revelation of the World Cup second round in Quebec was the fourth placed 28-year-old David Morris, who had a World Cup career best of 6th going into the event.

With a podium finish well within sight after the early rounds, Morris made it through to the four man super-final with eventual winner Dmitri Dashinski from Belarus, Canadian Travis Gerrits and China’s Hang Zhou.

Performing a full-full-full, a jump he has completed almost perfectly at least 10 times in the last week, the Australian failed to hit his landing, forcing Morris forward into the snow.

The landing mishap, after the rest of the trick went perfectly, cost him a chance to stand on a World Cup podium for the first time in his career.

Australia’s current Olympic gold medallist Lydia Lassila made a strong return to the elite level of aerial skiing in Changchun, China, today when she finished second in her first World Cup competition in almost three years.

However, despite her impressive return, Lassila, who became a mother for the first time in 2011, will not yet allow herself to start thinking about the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympic Games.

The Australian Institute of Sport / Victorian Institute of Sport athlete said she would have been disappointed had she not recorded her 30th World Cup podium finish today.

“I wanted to be on the podium and that’s what I thought I could do,” Lassila said.

“It’s too early to start thinking of another Olympic medal. Obviously that is what I dream of, and that is why I’m here, but there is a lot of building to do.”

Finishing second to China’s Mengtao Xu and ahead of Nina Li, also from China, clearly signaled to the skiing world that Lassila is back with the same desire that propelled her to Olympic glory in February 2010.

Right from the start of the first World Cup aerial event of the season, Lassila made it clear that her intentions would not revolve around “easing” her way back into competition.

She finished fourth in qualifying with a full-full scoring 89 points and then increased the degree of difficulty in the first final with a double full-full, earning 94 points and a place in the super-final contested by the day’s best four athletes.

Competing for the first time in the new two finals format, Lassila maintained her degree of difficulty in the final round with a full-double-full, a double somersault with three twists, but with a double twist on the second flip, picking up 97 points in the minus 18 degree conditions to snare second place.

Lassila said that she was thrilled by the result but at the same time, she expects that sort of result of herself.

“I knew that if I could get to the final four, I’d have a pretty good chance of being on the podium.

“That was the first time I have competed with that format so I didn’t know what to expect other than expecting it to be a long day.

“As it turned out, the format was less of the big deal than what I thought it would be and that was surprising.

“The girl that won did triples, so there was nothing I could do about that at this stage.

“Today gives me a lot more confidence for when I start to do triples again.”