Australian halfpipe World Champion Scotty James has finished ninth in the opening World Cup of the season.

After topping the qualification heats on Friday, James was unable to replicate his near perfect scores finishing with a best total of 38.75 in the ten man final.

Japan's Ayuma Hirano claimed the victory with a score of 95.25 ahead of the USA's Ben Ferguson and Shaun White.

The VIS rider was unable to stick any of his runs, opening with a 19.00, before putting together his best run of 38.75 before closing out with a 16.75.

Fellow Australian Kent Callister finished 23rd overall.

In the women’s event Lillehammer 2016 Youth Olympic silver medallist Emily Arthur put down two solid runs of 58.66 and 60.00 to finish ninth in her qualification heat and an overall placing of 16th.

The women's event was an American clean sweep, with Chloe Kim taking the win ahead of Maddie Mastro and Kelly Clark.

James and his Australian teammates will now turn their attention to the Dew Tour event at Breckenridge which begins on Thursday.

Matt Bartolo
olympics.com.au

It didn’t take very long for Scotty James to show why he is the world’s leading halfpipe rider.

The 23-year-old VIS World Champion threw down a near perfect 97.00 second run to win his qualification heat and record the highest score of the day at the opening World Cup of the season at Copper Mountain.


Competing in the opening qualification heat, James scored 92.33 on his first run before going even bigger next time down.

Japan’s Raibu Katayama also impressed with a 96.00 in his opening run of the second qualification heat while USA star Shaun White scored a 94.33 to set up a tantalising final on Sunday morning.

Fellow Aussie and Sochi 2014 Olympian Kent Callister scored 64.00 and 63.33 to finish 11th in James’ heat.

In the women’s event Lillehammer 2016 Youth Olympic silver medallist Emily Arthur put down two solid runs of 58.66 and 60.00 to finish ninth in her qualification heat.

The USA’s Maddie Mastro and Chloe Kim dominated proceedings with best scores of 91.33 and 89.00 as they easily progressed through to the eight-strong final.

With qualification out of the way James will now look to perform when it counts – in the ten-man final.

That goes down from 5am on Sunday morning (AEDT).

Live scoring will be available here>>> and you can watch the event live on Eurosport – Channel 511 on Foxtel. 

Matt Bartolo
olympics.com.au

IMAGE: the Copper Mountain Halfpipe © FIS

Scotty James has put down “the run of his life” to win gold at the Phoenix PyeongChang Snowboard Halfpipe World Cup.

His third and final run in today’s competition not only secured James the individual World Cup victory, but he takes home the overall 2016/2017 Snowboard Halfpipe World Cup series crown.

In an Australian first, Scotty James is the current World Cup, World Championship and X Games champion. He wears three of the four major world snowboard halfpipe crowns, the fourth being Olympic glory.

“I am absolutely over the moon!” James said.

“I knew what I had to do to come away with a win today and I just had to let the rest do the talking.

“To come away on top is just an amazing feeling.”

The two-time VIS Olympian qualified for the final in fifth place. After a shaky start, only scoring 24.75 points in the first run of the final, James returned to his exceptional form to score 92.25 in the second run, before his series winning 96-point performance.


“The first one was just trying to get the jitters out,” the 22-year-old said.

“I unfortunately came unstuck, but was able to put the next two down and probably the run of my life on the last one.

“I knew I had to mix it up to come away with a win today, especially with a field like there is here.”

To claim the win, James had to defeat legendary American snowboarder Shaun White.

White is a two-time Olympic gold medallist, and winner of 24 winter and summer X Games medals in
snowboarding and skateboarding.

Winner of the Mammoth World Cup last weekend, White threatened James’ victory today, finishing second overall, a mere one point behind James with a score of 95. China’s Yiwei Zhang won bronze with 93.25.

James entered the final World Cup event sitting in second place on the overall leader board with 1700 points, trailing American Chase Josey by 260 points.

His victory at Bokwang Snow Park scored him 1000 points towards the discipline world standings and he claimed the overall series with 2700 points.

Josey finished second overall with 2360 points and White won bronze with 1930 points.

James is having the season he’s always hoped for.

After finishing in the top 10 for all World Cup events this season - including winning silver in Laax in January – the 2015 World Champion won gold in the men’s SuperPipe at the 2017 Aspen X Games on Australia Day.

“I am in a really good place at the moment on my board and off my board – life is really good.

“I’ve made big changes in my off-season and my pre-season. I started to take myself a little bit more seriously and approach it with a different attitude, and I will continue to do that.”

To further sweeten today’s glory, his win comes at the Test Event for the 2018 Winter Olympic Games.

According to James the pipe itself is exceptional, as is the atmosphere in PyeongChang.

“It has been an amazing week here in Korea – they have put on an amazing event for us.

“I absolutely love South Korea. The people here have been awesome, everyone loves snowboarding and is very supportive and helpful.

“And then the halfpipe obviously - they really turned that up for us.

“They’ve put on a really good pipe and I’m sure it’s going to be exactly the same next year, so I think we can expect another really fierce competition in a year’s time.”

Teammate Kent Callister also qualified for today’s 10-man final, finishing in eighth place; while Nate Johnstone finished 31st.

In the women’s competition, 2016 Youth Olympian Emily Arthur had her first top-10 finish for the season, placing 10th with a run of 72.25. Triple Olympian Holly Crawford placed 13th and is now heading to Sapporo to represent Australia at the Asian Winter Games.

Although the World Cup season has come to an end, it is not the end of the Northern Hemisphere winter season for our snowboarders. James will now fly back to the US for the next American Cup, before defending his World Championship title in Sierra Nevada, Spain in March.

And he cannot wait for more to come.

“I’m in a really good place now, but I’ve still got a bit of a fire under my butt!

“I still want to keep on pushing and I’ve got stuff to work on to keep solidifying my place on top of the podium.

“I’ve now got a bit of a target on my back, but I like this position and I will keep working hard to make sure I can stay on top.”

Georgia Thompson
olympics.com.au

IMAGE: Halfpipe World Cup podium with (ltr) 2nd Shaun White (USA), 1st Scotty James (AUS) and 3rd Yiwei Zhang (CHN) in Bokwang Phoenix Park. Photo: Mateusz Kielpinski

Weather has played havoc at the US Snowboard and Freeskiing Grand Prix event in Mammoth Mountain, CA, USA, with events shortened or cancelled completely.
 
The US Grand Prix also doubles as a FIS World Cup event counting towards Olympic qualification. Unfortunately, wild weather featuring high winds and snow forced the cancellation of the men’s Slopestyle Skiing event which was to feature Russ Henshaw and Ryley Lucas. The extremely heavy conditions led to the men’s Snowboard Halfpipe and Slopestyle qualification rounds to be abandoned.
 
In total, four top ten performances where achieved by the Australian athletes across three different disciplines.
 
The highlight of the event was 16-year-old NSWIS Snowboarder Tess Coady placing sixth in the slopestyle final in her first ever World Cup. Jess Rich was unable to advance to the eight woman final, finishing in 21st place.
 
VIS 2017 X-Games Gold Medallist Scotty James was the leading Australian male in the men’s Snowboard Halfpipe, finishing in sixth place. NSWIS riders Kent Callister and Nathan Johnstone also had good runs in the difficult conditions placing eighth and eleventh respectively.
 
In the women’s Snowboard Halfpipe, Holly Crawford made a positive start to her first event of the season finishing in eighth place, just missing advancing to the final by two places. Emily Arthur was also in action with a 14th place qualification performance.
 
The Snowboard Halfpipe athletes now head to PyeongChang, Korea, for the Olympic Test Event World Cup, with the Slopestyle Snowboarders and Skiers off to World Cup events in Quebec City, Canada.

IMAGE: Tess Coady in nicer weather conditions at Mammoth at the start of the week! © Tess Coady Instagram

After becoming one of the nation’s youngest ever Winter Olympians in 2010, James competed at his second Games in 2014 and went on to become World Champion in 2015.
 
It wasn’t much of a surprise then when he went out and backed up his World Cup silver to start 2017 with X Games gold last weekend in Aspen.
 
“It was overwhelming,” James said.
 
“I had so much support from Australia as well as the US on the back of the event. It was quite special having some of the family at the bottom there watching too.”
 
The young gun will now look to continue that hot form when he hits the pipe at the Mammoth Mountain World Cup event in California this weekend.
 
“I am feeling great on my board and the past couple of competitions have been a result of my preparation for this year. It's been an awesome ride so far and looking forward to more.
 
“I have come down with a bit of a cold post X Games but I have been up riding the practice days. I really love Mammoth and the pipe here and am excited for this week.”
 
James will be joined by rising star and 2016 Winter Youth Olympic silver medallist Emily Arthur and three-time Olympian Holly Crawford.
 
Arthur recently finished 19th at the opening World Cup event of the season in Copper Mountain and will be looking to push her way up the rankings.
 
“It's been super fun being out in Mammoth and the pipe is insanely good,” said Arthur.
 
“It’s also nice as I have been based here this season so it's kind of like being on my home turf.”
 
“It's such a stacked field out here I'm just planning to go out, land some runs and have fun. Hopefully it will pay off.”
 
Like many of her Australian counterparts Arthur was stoked to see one of her teammates rise to the top of the sport.
 
“Scotty has been killing the game and it's so rad to see, it's kept Australia frothing and me too for sure.
 
“Hopefully some of his success rubs off on us.”
 
For Crawford the event will be a chance to get back on the snow as she competes at her first FIS event in just under 12 months as she looks to push towards a fourth Olympic appearance in PyeongChang.
 
“I’ve only been back on my board for a little over a week since early March last year so I’m just hoping to get back into the swing of things and hopefully come out with a good result,” Crawford said.
 
“The pipe has been really good here and practice has gone well. Unfortunately there is some bad weather coming in so fingers crossed it holds off.”
 

Current World Champion Snowboarder Scotty James has made a strong start to his 2016-2017 northern hemisphere season, finishing fourth in the halfpipe final at the US Snowboard Grand Prix/World Cup event in Copper Mountain, Colorado, USA.
 
Competing in the best of three run final, the Victorian Institute of Sport (VIS) athlete produced his best in the third run, scoring 88.75 to narrowly miss out on the podium.

Ahead of Scotty where Swiss riders Patrick Burgener and 2014 Olympic Champion Iouri Podladtchikov, who took out the first two places of the podium withh American Chase Josey in third.

Post-race, James said he was happy with the result despite the weather and equipment issues, grateful for his best off-season to date.

"Due to the weather, my snowboards I was riding through practise couldn't cut it on Semi-Finals day. I ended up riding my coach James Jacksons snowboard in Semi finals which was 10cms too short and a board I have never ridden before," he explained.

"For finals I rode a two year old board I pulled from the archives but with a strong preparation for the season, nothing was gonna stop me!"

"Would have been great to finish on the podium but I'm fired up and ready for the next competition in LAAX."

James will head back home to Warrandyte in Victoria for Christmas, before jumping straight back onto a plane to the US to begin his next preparation. 

In the women's final, teenage sensation Chloe Kim took first place with Chinese athletes Jiayu Liu and Xuetong Cai  in second and third place.
 
The qualification round took place a few days earlier, featuring Kent Callister, Nathan Johnstone and Emily Arthur. Unfortunately all three athletes where unable progress to the final, with Kent and Nathan finishing in 15th and 41st place with Emily 19th.

Current World Champion Snowboarder Scotty James has made a strong start to his 2016-2017 northern hemisphere season, qualifying second in his heat to advance through to the halfpipe final at the US Snowboard Grand Prix/World Cup event in Copper Mountain, Colorado, USA.
 
Competing under the best of two runs format in the heat round, The Victorian Institute of Sport (VIS) athlete produced his best in the second run, scoring 83.75 to secure one of the ten places available in the final.
 
Also in action in the men’s event for Australia, but unable to qualify for the final was Kent Callister in 15th and Nathan Johnstone 41st.
 
In the women’s event, NSWIS Youth Olympic Winter Games Silver Medallist Emily Arthur was unable to qualify for the six-person final, finishing in 19th place.
 
After the successful qualification round, James commented.
 
“Competed in some interesting conditions today, but pulled through. Excited for finals!”
 
The men’s Halfpipe Snowboard final featuring Scotty James will take place Friday afternoon in the USA, Saturday morning AEST.
 
 

A brilliant effort from 17-year-old Emily Arthur during last weekend's halfpipe final of the season opening 2016 U.S Revolution Tour, landed her in fourth place as she continued her outstanding push up the world rankings.

The talented Aussie who trains with the New South Wales Institute of Sport (NSWIS), fought hard in a highly-contested event against Olympic standard athletes to score 110 points in the opening halfpipe competition of the season at Colorado's Copper Mountain.

Currently ranked 13th in the world, Arthur has been in solid form since her silver medal at the Lillehammer 2016 Winter Youth Olympic Games and will be one to watch in the coming years as she works towards PyeongChang in 2018.
​
In the Men’s field, Nathan Johnston finished with a score of 70.40 to sit in an impressive 8th in the final standings, while Scotty James and Kent Callister did not compete.

The event is the perfect warm-up to the Grand Prix World Cup later this week, also based at Copper Mountain, with all four Aussies competing.

Three Australians will be aiming to impress in the Snowboard Halfpipe as the 2017 U.S Revolution Tour kicks off tonight (AEDT) at Colorado’s Copper Mountain.

Scotty James, Kent Callister and Nathan Johnstone will all contest the first of four stops on the tour in Copper’s world class 19-meter superpipe, their first time on the pipe for the season.

James and Callister have both been training in New Zealand during Spring and will be keen to start the year off with success.

The start of the tour itself was interrupted due to unreasonably warm temperatures and delays in halfpipe construction, condensing the competition to just one halfpipe event instead of two.

In a statement on the official World Snowboard Tour (WST) website, USSA Director of Events Eric Webster said, “Weather has been a challenge this season but the Main Vein Superpipe upholds its reputation as one of the top venues in North America while the Rev Tour remains a top competition for these up-and-coming athletes.”

The national-level event brings together Olympic hopefuls who will earn points for their overall ranking in the WST.

22-year-old James, currently ranked 15th in the world, will headline the Aussie brigade, aiming to match his successful 2013/14 season where he finished 5th in the overall World Tour rankings.

The youngest of the three, 21-year-old Callister is ranked 26th and will be searching for a repeat of his success at the Tour in 2012 where he won best trick with a FS inverted 900. Johnstone is ranked 37th.

Qualification starts early morning Sunday, followed by the Final.

Keep your eye out in the Ladies for 17-year-old  Emily Arthur, one of Australia’s brightest talents who won Silver in the halfpipe at the Lillehammer 2016 Youth Olympic Games in February. Her qualification is at 2:30am, with the final starting at 3:50am.
​
For more information on the Revolution Tour, visit www.ussnowboarding.com/revolutiontour

Australian snowboarder Emily Arthur has finished second in the halfpipe at the Lillehammer 2016 Youth Olympic Games, with teammate Mahalah Mullins 15th. Arthur, who was the Team flag bearer, won the silver medal with a score of 90.00 with a sensational performance on her second of three runs, in the pipe at Oslo Vinterpark.

She finished behind American two-time X-Games Champion Chloe Kim (96.50) with Korean Yu-rim Yeong (84.50) claiming the bronze.

"I'm so excited," said the 16-year-old from Woronora Heights in Sydney.

"When I landed my second run I was over the moon and couldn't keep back my smile. I'm so, so happy."

Arthur started with a great first run of 87.25 to sit seven points behind Kim. The American then improved to 96.50 and the Australian with some more confidence and amplitude improved to 90.0.

On the third and final run 15-year-old sensation Kim had another great run but could not improve her score. Arthur had a fall on the final run with the silver medal already guaranteed.

"After my first run I was in the high 80s and I was really confident heading into my next run. When I got into the 90s I was amazed and so happy.

"Chloe (Kim) killed it and I just came to land my run and I did that so I'm stoked." 

Arthur, whose parents are here from Sydney, had two falls at her last World Cup in Park City, but delivered here at the Youth Olympics when it mattered most.

"We are so happy for her," said Emily's mum Sandra. 

“The crew and support have been amazing and it was definitely worth the trip.”

Coach Johnny Lipzker was equally as proud of the young gun with a heap of potential.

“It’s awesome,” he said. “She came here to do a run, she landed it and it was good enough for second. We are all so stoked for her.”

“To pull out some of the best runs of your life when it matters the most is every athlete’s dream,” added Australian Chef de Mission Ian Chesterman who was cheering Emily home.

“Emily was not far behind the number one women’s halfpipe athlete in the world so it shows she has class and produces it when it matters the most.”

While the future is bright for Arthur, she is pretty excited just to get back to the Village to see all her Aussie teammates.

“The Village is going to be crazy. I’m excited to see everyone again, I’ve missed all my roommates (since moving down to Oslo) so it should be great.

Mullins from Albury in NSW competed in the pipe for experience and she can now focus on her pet slopestyle event later in the week, where she has finished top 10 in a senior World Cup this season. Arthur will also compete in slopestyle.

The medal here at Lillehammer 2016 continues Australia’s podium streak in Olympic winter competition which started with short track relay bronze back at Lillehammer in 1994.

Andrew Reid
olympics.com.au