Kiwi Snow Sports NZ Development athletes are continuing to shine on the world stage, with the snowboarders claiming two gold medals and a silver medal at the World Rookie Tour Halfpipe and Slopestyle finals held in Austria today (CET).
Cam Melville Ives (Wānaka, 16) started the podium streak this morning, claiming the gold medal in the Snowboard Halfpipe finals with a phenomenal score of 95.33. Melville Ives landed a solid run that included back to back double cork 1080s on his first two hits.
Melville Ives was stoked with his performance, saying; “Winning World Rookie Tour really means a lot to me, it’s a really cool event with all your friends. I really enjoyed riding at Kitzsteinhorn, it has a really nice pipe and it was awesome to land the winning run on my first run as it removed the pressure for me.”
Melville Ives had a career first in his second run, landing a frontside double cork 1260 for the first time in competition. Although a bobble on his first hit meant his second run didn’t score higher than his first run, it was a fantastic achievement to land that trick.
Ava Beer (Te Anau, 14) finished in silver medal position in the women’s snowboard halfpipe event in the Groms division with a solid performance. Beer said, “It feels awesome to podium at World Rookie Tour today, I’m hyped to land my runs in the pipe, especially stomping my back to back 360s!”
After a successful morning for the NZ team in the halfpipe, Lucia Georgalli (Wānaka, 16) showed that the Kiwi talent is just as dominant on the slopestyle course, securing the gold medal this afternoon.
Georgalli, who has come into this event off the back of her first European Cup podium just six days ago, dominated the field from the first run of finals.
Georgalli explained, “I am very happy that I won today. My highlights from my run were landing my front 720 and back 720. The vibe here today was awesome and the quality of the field was good. All the riders were throwing down really good tricks.”
14 months ago