Luca Harrington and Mengting Liu take their first World Cup wins in Klagenfurt

THE WOMEN

The women kicked things off just as the sun was setting and the lights were fully taking over in the stadium. The size of the scaffold is put into perspective when placed inside a stadium – the top of the inrun rises above the roof of the stands, so the skiers are dropping down into the stadium.

Having qualified in last, Sarah Hoefflin dropped in first, landing a left double cork 1080 safety – the first of many on the night. Wheelying out of the landing it could be argued she was afterbanging but, understandably, the judges did not see it that way and only awarded her an 82.20. Up-and-coming Swiss rider, fresh from European Cup success last season, Anouk Andraska also landed a double cork 1080 safety but with more control which earned her an 83.20. Muriel Mohr showed that difficulty is not all about spinning or flipping more by narrowly beating both of the swiss girls scores with a switch left bio 900 tail grab – 84.00. 

Winner on this same jump in Chur, Mathilde Gremaud landed her signature carved left double cork 1260 safety. The trick was slightly short on the landing and the grab was not held for very long but still put her in provisional first place with an 89.40. However, it was short lived as Flora Tabanelli landed a perfect left double cork 1260 safety – she had better amplitude and a longer grab compared to Mathilde and rightly scored a 91.00. Last to drop, first place qualifier Mengting Liu did the best left double cork 1080 safety of the first runs – going the biggest of anyone and getting rewarded for it – 85.20.

Run Two:

Anouk, who was riding in her first world cup final, landed a switch right bio 900 safety – a trick that she only learnt 6 weeks ago in Stubai – putting her in provisional first place with an 80.00. Muriel added to the double cork 1080 safety count to jump in front of Anouk with an 82.20. 

The score ranges are really important in big air finals – because the two scores are added up, the values matter a lot. Similar tricks performed with similar execution should be scored in the same range. With lots of double cork 1080 safety grabs being landed, the judges need to put these tricks within the same range, but they need to differentiate on execution – length of grab, amplitude, axis etc. For example, in this contest, there was around a four point range between the best double 10 safety and the worst. 

Next to drop, Mathilde uncharacteristically crashed on her switch left double cork 1080 – she missed the grab and came up short on the rotation. Mengting then perfectly mirrored her first trick with right double 1080 safety, again going big and grabbing well with a compact body position and took a decent lead with an 85.40.

Run Three:

As is customary, the skiers dropped in reverse rank order, meaning Mathilde was first to drop in for run three. She drowsily mistimed the take-off and underrotated her switch double cork 1080 tail – crashing again on a trick she looked like she could do in her sleep in Chur. Maybe hoping it was all a bad dream she lay down on the sofa and pretended to nap as her score came in.

Sarah also struggled, catching an edge in the transition of the take-off giving everyone a scare. Cat-like, she landed safely but has previously admitted to struggling with night time finals and says she gets easily disorientated due to the dark skies, bright lights and lack of horizon. 

Anouk tried to take her switch bio 900 to a 1080 but crashed in doing so guaranteeing podiums for the last three riders to drop. Muriel failed to land a double cork 1080 japan which would have certainly seen her improve. With second place secured, and needing an 80.00 to take first place, Flora tried to improve her switch bio 900 mute. With better amplitude and a longer grab she improved but it was only enough for a 79.20, leaving Mengting at the top with the honor of a  victory lap and her first World Cup win in only her 5th World Cup start. Back-to-back double cork 1080 safeties for the win.

Final Women’s Podium: Mengting Liu in first place, Flora Tabanelli in second and Muriel Mohr in third.

THE MEN

On the men’s side there were some surprising riders that made it through to finals, and some notable exceptions. Tormod Frostad – who has podiumed every event of the season so far – failed to make finals with podium threats Dylan Deschamps and Miro Tabenelli also missing out. French rider, Tim Sivignon, slightly surprisingly qualified first from his heat and Matej Svancer (less surprisingly) won the other side of the draw. The nature of the jump seems to even out the playing field, giving opportunities to riders who might normally be outgunned on larger jumps. Axel Burmansson and Cody Laplante were both competing in their first World Cup finals and Antoine Adelisse his first in a few years. They all brought flavour and unique styles, however none managed to break the top six.

Run One:

Fabian Boesch stomped a clean switch left double cork 1800 safety to start things off in ernest for an 85.00. Norwegian, Ulrik Samnoey started off churning the milk with a switch left tail butter double cork 1440 blunt – it was a thing of beauty, the blunt was capped and tweaked – scoring him an 87.60. Andri Ragettli scored just below Ulrik with an 86.00 doing his “standard” left double cork 1800 cuban.

Off the back of an impressive performance in Beijing, young Kiwi Luca Harrington unleashed the insane switch right triple cork 1620 esco. The way he is grabbing and able to complete this rotation is incredible – he is holding the grab for longer than Pablo’s prison sentence and just like the cartel leader’s workforce, the judges were not going to argue and awarded Luca a 94.80.

Tim Sivignon showed the world how they do butter in La Clusaz, flexing his tips on a left nose butter triple cork 1440 high mute and got rightly hooked up for it – 91.80. Home favourite and winner in Chur, Matej Svancer dropped in next as the crowd made themselves heard, knocking Tim into third place with a left nose butter triple cork 1620 safety. The landing was the definition of bolts and the butter was fully salted – 93.00.

Run Two:

Andri went into first place landing his switch left double bio 1620 with a safety grab, again more of what we have come to expect from Andri. Kuura Koivisto landed a really cool triple wobble cork 1620 safety, the axis was flat but the landing was not super clean – similar to his first trick – which kept him from troubling the podium. 

Luca greased the Alex Hall inspired right double cork 1080 bringback to 900 japan flawlessly. Luca grabs throughout the trick, including the part where he is changing his momentum, and the judges rewarded this with an 87.60 giving Luca a strong lead. Tim Sivignon backed his first trick up with a switch left double bio 1620 meader grab – right hand mute, left hand tail – a crazy grab combo for this trick, 88.60 was good enough for second place. 

Trying to repeat both the winning tricks from Chur, Matej landed his switch left tail butter double cork 1440 japan but only scored 82.40 this time round – possibly getting punished for not buttering his tails that well and a relatively short grab.

Run Three:

Fabian Boesch, who was sitting in fifth, cleaned up his left double cork 1800 lead blunt, improving his score but not his ranking. Andri added a buick grab to his switch left double bio 1620 but landed backseat and could not ride out of the transition cleanly. He did not improve, staying in fourth place, leaving the last three riders to drop with guaranteed podiums – the order was all to play for.

Matej improved his butter on the switch left tail butter double cork 1440 safety but slipped the grab early and therefore could not improve his score. Tim – who had already secured his best World Cup result – needed only two more points to put himself on the top spot. Repeating the switch left double bio 1620 meader grab, bettering it this time by grabbing blunt with the left hand and ripping the right hand mute. Tim sent it to the moon but could not squat the landing out clean enough, dragging a hand and giving the win to Luca.

With true kiwi class, Luca gave us a double backflip as his victory lap, pleasing the crowd and the judges alike, getting honored with a 42.00 – the highest score possible. Another crazy big air final for the books with all of the top five performing near perfect tricks – the judges did well to pick the riders apart.

Final Men’s Podium: first place Luca Harrington, second Tim Sivignon and third place Matej Svancer.

Luca and Mingteng both took their first World Cup wins, with many unexpected riders pushing for the top spots – has the new year brought a changing of the guard? There is not long to wait to find out as the next big air takes place next weekend, again in Austria – check back here later in the week for what to expect and how to watch.