Last fall, Maxence Parrot was the first Canadian athlete to be officially named to the Canadian Olympic team for the Beijing Games.
• Read also: Maxence Parrot: a normal person?
• Read also: Laurie Blouin adds a medal to her hunting list
Saturday evening, the snowboarder showed that he was ready for the next Olympic fortnight, when he ranked second in the big jump (Big Air) of the prestigious X Games disputed in Aspen (Colorado), one point behind the winner. , the Norwegian Marcus Kleveland (82 points).
Bronze was awarded to Finland’s Rene Rinnekangas (80 points).
The Bromontois’ two best jumps were on his first and fifth run, where he obtained scores of 40 and 41 respectively. Steamboat in December – won silver in the slopestyle course in Pyeongchang four years ago.
Earlier in the morning, Parrot finished seventh in the slopestyle event, which was won by Saskatchewan’s Mark McMorris.
Édouard Therriault very close to winning a medal
It took the most spectacular jump of the big jump ski competition (Big Air) to dislodge Édouard Therriault from the podium. And that’s what American Alex Hall did on his fifth and final attempt, shooting a 2160 to jump from fourth to first place.
Behind Hall (94), American Mac Forehand (92) and Canadian Teal Harle (91) follow in second and third place. Therriault finished fourth with 89 points.
The Quebecer was quickly able to forget his first try where his left ski had come off his boot as soon as he came out of the jump. The 18-year-old skier was able to complete his aerial maneuvers, except his landing was obviously missed.
In the fourth and penultimate round, the athlete from Lorraine superbly executed his throw jump and landed from behind which gave him 47 points and a total of 86 points, which provisionally ranked him first.
The young skier was once again spectacular in the fifth round collecting 42 points, 89 points in total.
He came close to landing his 1980 on his last attempt, but was unable to improve on his best two jump total.
Elizabeth Hosking held back by her 1080
Elizabeth Hosking gave it her all in her first appearance at the X Games, except that her most difficult maneuver gave her a hard time on her four runs in the halfpipe. She finished seventh in the competition where the Japanese Sena Tomita was crowned.
High in the first two manoeuvres, the snowboarder from Mille-Isles was unable to perfectly execute the 1080 she was attempting in the third figure on each descent. It was on the second of her four passes that she came closest to making it, but she hit the wall of the halfpipe with the front of her board just before completing her third and final rotation.
The athlete managed to save the furniture on landing, except that it caused him to lose speed. Consequently, her next maneuver was much lower and the games were made for her.
“It’s my first X Games and that’s not how I wanted it to happen,” she said, visibly disappointed. “The X Games is an event and not a competition like the World Cups. I could still have managed my performance better tonight.
Hosking will have the chance to resume another big event soon: the Beijing Olympics. She believes her experience on Saturday will serve her well in the future.
“The more times I’m in that position at a big event, the better I can handle going forward. But to be honest, at the moment, the wound is still open, but in the next few days I will no longer see the positive”, concluded the one who will head for the Chinese capital in a week.
Earlier in the day, snowboarder Laurie Blouin was in action at the big jump (Big Air) where she finished in fifth place. The best two of the five jumps were retained for the final mark.
Her first pass was the most profitable, when she amassed 38 points, which placed her in third place provisionally. The Stoneham snowboarder scored lower on her next four jumps to finish last. The day before, she had been bronze medalist in the acrobatic descent (slopestyle).