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As the Snow League looks to shake up how halfpipe competitions play out, Friday was the teaser for Saturday’s big shakeup.
On qualifying day on Friday, snowboarders approached the general heat format similarly to a condensed version qualifier that you would see in a World Cup or X Games — instead of competing in a field of eight or more, athletes vied only against a handful of others, best run advancing. Things changed, however, for those who didn’t get a first seed and had to compete for their event lives in a “last chance qualifier,” tasked with putting down their best runs after a full day of competition — in a pipe that was deteriorating under sunshine and nonstop runs of snowboards.
“You have to feel good when you qualify straight to the quarterfinals,” men’s fourth-heat winner Alessandro Barbieri said. “I’m just happy I don’t have to keep riding, like get too tired for tomorrow because I want to stay fresh and it wasn’t easy conditions.
“If I had not qualified right now, I would have done … more runs. I don’t know the exact math, but it would have been draining.”
American Maddie Mastro was one of the big winners of the day, throwing a 90-point run on her first trip down the pipe and coasting to not just a heat victory but to a No. 1 seed in Saturday’s quarterfinals, as well. It ended up as the only 90-pointer of the day — among men or women — and her competition day was done by 10 a.m.
“Coming into this contest is a big question mark and unknown in a way,” Mastro said. “This format’s never been done before, we’ve never competed at this contest before, so I definitely had, I’d say, elevated stress levels. So (winning the heat) kind of helps me take a breath and have a bit of a breather and say, ‘OK, it’s just snowboarding. That’s all this is, let’s not make it too complicated.’”
Others weren’t so lucky, scraping their way through with four competitive runs. China’s Jiayu scored an 82.50 in her second run in the third heat, but still finished herself third out of four after a tough heat draw put her in with Korea’s Gaon Choi and Japan’s Mitsuki Ono. She was on the outside looking in on the quarterfinal picture until her last run of the day, when a 73.25 on a slushy left side of the pipe was enough to place her second in the last-chance qualifier. On the men’s side, Japan’s Ryusei Yamada was in a similar situation, putting down a 83.75 in his second last-chance run to clear out a 9.50 from an incomplete first run.
New Zealand’s Campbell Melville-Ives took a tough draw behind Japan’s Ayumu Hirano in the second heat. Melville-Ives put down an 86.75 in his second run in his heat — which would have won any of the other three heats — but couldn’t leap over Hirano’s 88.25 and was sent to the last-chance qualifier.
He couldn’t put down a clean run in the last-chance round and his day ended despite the second-best score of the heat rounds.
“When I saw the heat that got drawn, it was a little bit of a shock when you see an Olympic champion and the world champion in your same heat,” Melville-Ives said after his heat. “That was definitely pretty intimidating but pretty inspiring.”
It was one of the quirks of the new format that is a fresh take on halfpipe competition, which seemed to be well received by the competitors.
Day one was a dip-of-the-toes, but today will be an entire shakeup, pitting athletes head-to-head, run-by-run. Boarders will compete in a best-of-three-runs format, with the higher seed getting the advantage of dropping in second in the first run, seeing what score they need to beat.
An additional wrinkle is that athletes must drop in from both sides of the pipe in their first two runs, meaning they can’t just rely on their go-to run.
“I’m excited for the head-to-head because this will bring out the creativeness of the riders,” Barbieri said. “It’s like a duel. It reminds me of, like, MMA or boxing: You have to duel out with the other guy and I think there will be more grudges held against each other.”
In the quarterfinals, Mastro will draw Elizabeth Hosking, who posted an 80.00 behind Mastro in heat competition, but just snuck into day two with a 61.75 in the last-chance qualifier. No. 2 Choi draws No. 7 Xuoteng Cai; No. 3 Sena Tomita and No. 4 Sonny Alba will draw No. 5 Ono — whose best runs were separated by just 1.25 points in the heat round (86.75 to 85.50) before Ono posted an 84.50 to win the last chance qualifier.
On the men’s side, Ayumu Hirano’s 88.25 was the top score, clinching him the No. 1 seed against No. 8 Chaeun Lee. The 16-year-old Barbieri advances as the No. 2 seed and draws Leadville’s Chase Blackwell, who got lucky with a second place in his heat with just a 70.50 but put down an 83.00 in the last chance qualifier. Ruka Hirano (no relation to Ayumu) took the third seed and will face Yamada in a duel of Japanese compatriots. The same will be true of the 4-5 matchup as Yuto Totsuka takes on Shuichiro Shigeno.
Finals day starts at 9:40 a.m. with the women’s quarterfinals. Then the men will have their quarterfinals before the women hold their semifinals and finals back-to-back, followed by the men’s final two rounds. The day culminates with a musical performance by Big Boi scheduled for 2:20 p.m.
Tickets, results and more information are available at TheSnowLeague.com