Scandinavian snowboard games in Stockholm: Riders from Scandinavia have dominated the second Big Air contest of the 2007/2008 NOKIA Snowboard FIS Weltcup which was held in the Swedish capital today. We all know that Finns are into Big Air but it’s been a while that they dominated by far like today in the Stockholm Stadion: A complete podium sweep but with different names as one might had expected. It was Janne Korpi – and not Peetu Piiroinen or Risto Mattila who finished as runner-up ahead of Sami Saarenpaa – who was the lucky man enjoying the Champaign shower.
On his way to his
career's second Big Air World Cup triumph, the 21-years-old 2005 Halfpipe
Junior World Champion beat Stephan "Mu" Maurer in the eighth final and
thereafter Jonathan Nilsson who showed an impressive BS 7 lean in the contest.
But when it came to the semi finals, it was the first time for the new World
Cup leader to feel some thrilling tension and his heartbeat. Although he was
leading after the first jump - an easy landed FS 9 for what he had earned 24.8
points - he fell at the second one trying a SW BS 9 which brought him into the
uncomfortable situation to wait and see what Domen Bizjak would do. Up to this
point, the Slovenian had impressed with the second best result in the
qualifiers which were won by Mattila as well as some solid riding throughout
the whole day - and in contrary to Korpi, Bizjak sticked the SW BS 9. But due
to a shaky landing, the Finn made it to the super final with a tiny lead of
only 0.1 points.
There, he had to face
contest machine Risto Mattila. The last year's third has had some unintended
contact with the snow at the first tries in his quarter and semi finals only to
come back even stronger nailing his tricks and fight his way back to the
contest. But in the round of the last four, the 26-years-old snowboard star
also had the lucky end earning for his BS 9 just 0.1 points more than Saarenpaa
for his jump. But in the finals, Mattila lost his well-known control in both
runs so Korpi crowned himself with a sweet Cab 10 Nosegrab.
Before, the "stoked"
winner had never expected that he would have a chance to successfully compete
against Mattila in the superfinal, because "I didn't get along during the
qualification. But just after I changed my board for the K.o.-heats it was
getting better and better. I'm super stoked."
In contrary, Mattila
was in a sour mood. The 2005 Big Air World Champion had put his stamp on the
qualification but then started having problems during the finals: "I'm
disappointed with my riding because I wasn't able to handle the landing at
all." But ever since the Champaign
was handed out on the podium all frustration was gone again.
Besides the already
named Finns, another young talent showed once again his style after he had done
so in Moscow 2005: Juuso Laivisto styled a worth seeing FS 9 mute and made the
crowd scream with an almost landed double back flip.
More Facts:
Participants: 63 men from 14 nations
Arena:
Stockholm
Stadion, 1912 Olympic venue, 84 World Records
Snow:
200 tons of liquid nitrogen transforms into 600 m³ of snow
Ramp:
100 tons of scaffolding
Shaper:
David
Ny, Sweden
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