Gus Kenworthy captures victory in freeski slopestyle finals at 2011 New Zealand Winter Games
America’s Gus Kenworthy kept shining brightly at 2011 New Zealand Winter Games by following up his men’s ski halfpipe success on Wednesday with a victory in men’s freeski slopestyle finals that took place on Thursday, August 18, at Snow Park, New Zealand.
New Zealand’s Jossi Wells took runner-up place for the second time in two days, while America’s Nick Goepper finished third to round out the podium.
As the final kicked off at the Air New Zealand Freeski Slopestyle course, the 19-year-old Kenworthy immediately stole the show with a stunning first run. The run comprised of a 450 onto the down rail to switch, switch 270 onto the cannon rail misty 630 out,
left double cork 12 mute, switch right cork 10 tail, switch 540 up onto the butter pad and rodeo 540 Japan. Scoring 87.75 points off the incredible run, the American sealed the fate of the contest in his favour to collect his second win in just two days.
In an interview after the final, Kenworthy said, “I tried to use the momentum from yesterday's event and really come into today's slopestyle as eager as possible. Training went well this morning and the weather was great so everything was in place for me
to do what I needed to do.”
The hometown boy, Wells crashed in his first run, but came back strongly in the second run to secure second place with a score of 83.00. His second run consisted of an Ollie on from the side with a 450 off on the cannon box, followed by a switch right side
1080 tail grab to a switch left double cork 10, eventually capping off the run with a switch 540 onto the lily pad and a nose butter 540 off.
America’s Goepper scored 81.25 points off his second run to take third place and complete the podium. The right and left double cork 10s remained the biggest highlights of his impressive run.
PC Fosse and Jonas Hunziker rounded out the Top 5 after finishing with a score of 78.00 and 76.50 points respectively.
With the slopestyle becoming an Olympic discipline, the pressure seems to have mounted on the athletes. The intensity was quite high during the finals on Thursday, though it was clearly just a trailer of what is to come in the following months.
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