Italian siblings Flora and Miro Tabanelli are your top qualifiers through to tomorrows finals at the FIS ANC Premium Freeski Slopestyle presented by La Roche Posay & Cardrona Alpine Resort.
Tabanelli [Flora], the 2023 Winter Games NZ Freeski Slopestyle Junior World Championships silver medalist, threw down a technical run that put her 13 points ahead of her nearest competitor in today's qualification round. She had a stand out rail section, executing very cleanly on the rails and capped off her run with a switch bio misty 900 on the third jump.
Madeleine Disbrowe (Queenstown) and Sylvia Trotter (Wānaka) both qualified through to the finals, putting down solid runs on the Big Bucks terrain park slopestyle course.
In the men's semi-finals Olly Nicholls of Japan put down an impressive first run, but with the athletes dropping in reverse order it was a nervous wait. Miro Tabanelli had the pressure on for his second and final run, but that was no problem for the World Cup podium athlete.
Tabanelli [Miro] put down a highly technical run, with a very complex, smooth rail section. On the third rail his front cork 810 was one of the stand out tricks on that feature for the day. He followed that up with a very clean jump line, lacing together a double corked 1080 into a double corked 1260 tail grab and finished off with a switch double corked 1260.
Kiwi athletes Lucas Ball of Nelson and Fergus McArthur of Queenstown have also successfully made it into the top ten through to finals after putting down solid runs in both the men's qualification and semi-finals today.
The level of riding from the 59 athletes representing eight nations was exceptionally high, with Head Judge Jason Arens explaining; "We saw a very high level of skiing today, a great level of competition and we saw lots of really technical runs and great use of this unique course. The shark fin (second jump) is a defining factor among the field and really separating those who have qualified to finals.
Today’s event was the start of the second Slopestyle Australia New Zealand Cup (ANC) event of the 2024 season, with the valuable points counting towards the overall ANC series. The Kiwi or Australian winner of the series will be granted a personal FIS World Cup start for the upcoming Northern Hemisphere season, a hugely valuable opportunity for those athletes with their eyes set on the 2026 Olympic Winter Games.
With the top eight women and ten men qualifying through to finals, it is going to be quite the show on Thursday morning up here at Cardrona Alpine Resort!
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