Kicking Horse Mountain Resort proved to be a magical wonderland once again for the second FWT stop of the 2019 season.
After an unusually warm spell hit the Canadian Rockies in late January, a huge storm rolled through the mountains just in time for the tour. With it, came extremely cold temperatures that altered the snow conditions and most likely the live-stream as well.
On the snow, a very competitive women's field saw American Rookie Jacqueline Pollard take an early lead by linking up multiple features that looked quite scary and quite large. She estimates there might have been 3 or 4 turns in her run. Even though the women's field has never sent so big, Jacqueline was able to hold onto the lead until the end. There were many fast and creative runs that ended with crashes, and only four skiers ended with clean runs. Americans Pollard and Hazel Josie Birnbaum took Gold and Bronze while Arianna Tricomi took silver.
The theme of the men's competition echoed the women's: Fast speed, massive airs and no holding back. Berkeley Patterson began the men's ski portion of the competition with a score of 80.3 by jumping off a very very large cliff and stomping the landing. Tanner Hall skied next after Berkeley, after previously winning silver at his first-ever big mountain competition in Japan. Ski Boss charged all the way down the wind lip before launching a massive 360. His score of 78.00 was relatively low, but it was most likely due to hitting only one feature in his run. The stream-gods seemed to smile on us as Ski Boss's stream was lag-free.
Kristofer Turdell scored high with an 89.00 which put him in first - but not for long. Right after Kiwi Craig Murray skied a ridiculous run with a massive three followed by an equally large flat three. It scored the kiwi a 93.00 and put him in a well-deserved position to walk away with first place.
Markus Eder took a similar line, but slightly messier airs put him in second one point behind Murray with 92.00.
Logan Pehota billy-goated his way through the snowy sharks to, yet again, get an impressive final score in his homeland of Canada. His 91.00 earned him a 3rd place finish and a crowd of young admirers. Fabio Studer rounded out the field with a shifty-laden run, but not enough to trouble the podium. Craig Murray held to his first-place finish.
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