The Air&Style will celebrate 20 years of radness this winter, and to get you hyped on the latest edition, which will rock its spiritual home in Innsbruck’s Bergisel stadium from February 1-2 2013, they’ve pumped out this retrospective edit. Ingemar’s switch back 5 is still frickin’ awesome.

Feb. 1st & 2nd 2013, Bergisel Stadium Innsbruck with “Die Fantastischen Vier”, Mac Miller and Kraftklub live on stage and burn Style Session on Friday – the Air & Style heads into it’s 20th season and celebrates it with a 2 day event.

Remember, there’s also the Air&Style Beijing coming up too on December 8 2012, where the Birds Nest stadium will once again play host to some epic stunts and Shaun White will introduce it dressed like Michael Jackson from his Bad era. We’ve also heard rumours that there could be another Air&Style this season in a rather unexpected location, but that’s all the gossip we’ll divulge right now. Ok, Ok, it’s Mexico City from May 24-25 2013, alright? Read all the chatter here.

More info, tickets and whatnot on www.air-style.com

Henry Jackson’s back with another installment of his real raw web show, where he takes in the carnage at ISPO, gets the chat at the Air&Style and, being that it’s a Red Bull gig, has most of the hits from Travis Rice’s winning run at the Supernatural. Check it…

Check the action that went down in Innsbruck’s city centre at the Burn Fire and Steel jib contest that went down prior to the Billabong Air&Style.

At the Billabong Air&Style in Innsbruck last weekend not all of the snowboard action was centred on the Bergisel booter. No, around the time that the riders’ draw went down Burn Energy held a downtown jib jam in the city centre, where Swedish rider Noa Gadelius taking down Gulli Gudmundsson in the finals after a barrage of rail stunts had gone down.

Check this highlights edit rammed full of the best of the action.

Peetu Piiroinen: Winning Tricks at Air & Style 2012

Seppe Smits: Best Tricks at Air & Style 2012

Niklas Mattson: Best Tricks at Air & Style 2012

Air & Style 2012: All Highlights

Torgeir Bergrem soared a picture perfect Method over Innsbruck's skies that stoked the hell out of us Onboard hacks. Fist of nuff respect. All photos: Sami Tuoriniemi.

[CHECK THE BILLABONG AIR&STYLE 2012 VIDEOS WHEN YOU'RE DONE HERE]

Despite a stellar showing from rookies and big name pros alike on the Baltic, bulletproof Bergisel scaffold wedge, Peetu Piiroinen’s phenomenal consistency and ridiculously supersized hits saw him deservedly earn another Air&Style title last night. Check our Photo Ed’s Gallery of bang bangs first, and our report of how it went down which will follow below shortly…

The Friday night prior to the main event, amidst the Burn Rail Jam in downtown Innsbruck, the riders draw went down to decide who’d face off against who in the first round. This kind of head-to-head format has its advantages and disadvantages but despite the fact that there’s the potential for two big guns to meet early doors, its ease of understanding for the masses makes it an obvious choice for such a stadium event. When the names had come out of the tombola, this is how the first round panned out:

Seb Toutant v 4th Place Qualifier
Ståle Sandbech v 3rd Place Qualifier
Werni Stock v 2nd Place Qualifier
Nils Arvidsson v 1st Place Qualifier
Seppe Smits v Yuki Kadono
Ulrik Badertscher v Eero Ettala
Eric Willett v Roope Tonteri
Ethan Morgan v Peetu Piiroinen

The qualifiers kicked off on Saturday arvo with the dudes battling it out for the 4 spots that would get them into the main event and a chance to prolong their session on what Marko Grilc described as “the best the kicker’s ever been here.” Although it was bitterly cold and the landing must have resembled an ice rink, the guys chucked themselves for all their worth with Pat Burgener’s textbook switch backside 10 grabbed almost to the landing putting him through first, ahead of Niklas Matsson’s smooth front 10 dub, Torgeir Bergrem’s rapid Cab 12 and Petja Piiroinen’s properly doubled back 10.

Onto the main event and it was shaping nicely. The rookies from the qualis had their work cut out for them, certainly, but a couple of them defied expectations and dispatched their invited counterparts: Burgener’s flawless switch back 10 made short work of Nils Arvidsson’s iffy landings while Matsson’s clean landings made short work of Werni Stock‘s malfunctioning stomping legs.

There were no other major surprises in round 1 as veteran competitors Seb Toutant, Seppe Smits, Eric Willett and Peetu Piiroinen sent their invited opponents for early baths, the one eyebrow that was raised was when Ulrik Badertscher easily hopped over Eero Ettala‘s challenge by putting down a back 12 that Ettala could not match.

Much like the Champions League, it’s when the field gets narrower that things really get interesting and you can see who’s got the proper minerals. The draw had Toutant v Sandbech, Burgener v Smits, Matsson v Badertscher and Willett v Piiroinen in the Semi-off. Interesting times.

Toots has the front 10 dub pretty much on lock so Ståle needed to be on top of his game to progress, but it seemed he was having some issues as he’d let go the grab fairly early on his back 12 despite Toutant appearing to try to kill himself by riding the last bit of the kicker on his ass, somehow managing to control his flailing backflip to knuckle on his butt. His dub and regulation back 10 were enough though. Burgener was riding super well, but Seppe is a full-on machine so it was no surprise that he was sat in the lead with one hit to go. Pat knew he had to pull something special so went for… a back 14 triple cork. Sadly he overcooked it and took a tumble but in any conditions, let alone those in Innsbruck, that’s worth some full-on props. Matsson had been locking front 10 doubles like there’s no tomorrow from the qualifiers so when Badertscher couldn’t prevent a revert on the famed Ulrik flip it was the rookie who went through, and though Willett was stomping some techness Peetu Piiroinen was going bigger than everyone else while mixing between back 12s and Cab 12s. When Peetu’s on this kind of form it was always going to be bye bye Eric.

So, the finals rolled around with what you could call the usual suspects Seb Toutant, Peetu Piiroinen and Seppe Smits being joined by the new Rick Kane, Nicklas Matsson. And interesting side story was developing at the time, too. With Willett out Seppe could take the TTR Tour Big Air title depending on how he faired. Business time.

It was clear that with the monster consistency that Peetu’d shown all event that it would take something special to deny him and after 2 runs he was sat in first. Smits’ final cab 12 wasn’t as clean as he’d have liked, Matsson didn’t seem to have more than his front 10 double in his bag, so it was down to Seb Toutant on the last run of the contest to unset the Finn. He knew he had to send it, and send it he did with a back 14 triple cork attempt, the second of the night, but despite the unreal commitment it must have taken to dip his head for the third time all he got was an ass spanking and 4th place.

So Peetu won, Seppe took second and the TTR Big Air title, Matsson 3rd and Toots 4th. In the bulletproof conditions the riders were facing it was one hell of a performance. And one hell of a party at the Burn gig later it must be said.

RESULTS

This is a crop of a shot of Eero Ettala in the gallery that our photo ed will probably kill us for chopping for our own purposes. Place your bets. All Photos: Sami Tuoriniemi.

Training’s been going down in the bitter cold of Innsbruck’s Bergisel stadium in preparation for tomorrow’s madfest and the riders have been getting it done. Check the gallery and who got nasty at the pre-event rail jam put on by Burn.

And in the pre-event rail jam put on by Burn, Sweden’s Noah Gadelius came first followed by Gulli Gudmundsson and Flo Corzelius. We gotta give a big shoutout to the Burn massive for being frickin’ awesome, too. Thanks peoples.

Here’s the link to the stream. Click that bad boy from around 16.30 CET: www.air-style.com/de/id-2012-billabong-air-style-innsbruck/live

But hey. Also there’s only a few tickets left online and in ticket retailers for the Billabong Air & Style Innsbruck-Tirol 2012 so if you’re around Innsbruck get your arses in gear so you don’t miss the insanity. Ticket seller information and online purchase (print your ticket at home) here.

Some of the finest kicker riders on the planet will be doing their best to keep your fires stoked… well darn it let’s have a look who they are:

Starting list Top 16:

1 Peetu Piiroinen (FIN)
2 Sebastien Toutant (CAN)
3 Seppe Smits (BEL)
4 Werner Stock (AUT)
5 Nils Arvidsson (SWE)
6 Ulrik Badertscher (NOR)
7 Stale Sandbech (NOR)
8 Roope Tonteri (FIN)
9 Eric Willett (USA)
10 Eero Ettala (FIN)
11 Yuki Kadono (JPN)
12 Ethan Morgan (GER)
plus the top 4 from the qualification

Qualification riders:

13 Ethan Morgan (GER)
14 Dash Kamp (USA)
15 Torgeir Bergrem (NOR)
16 Marko Grilc (SLO)
17 Clemens Schattschneider (AUT)
18 Petja Piiroinen (FIN)
19 Jamie Nicholls (GBR)
20 Peter König (AUT)
21 Tom Klocker (AUT)
22 Christian Haller (SUI)
23 Pat Burgener (SUI)
24 Niklas Mattson (SWE)
25 Aleksander Ostreng (NOR)
26 Marco Grigis (ITA)

On Friday night starting at 5pm, don’t miss the Burn Rail Session, the Rider’s Draw, and a live concert by “The Heavy” all taking place at the Snow Festival on Maria-Theresien-Strasse in the heart of Innsbruck’s city center.

A word to the wise though, it will be one of the coldest Air & Style events we’ve had, and though we’ll do our best to make it impossible for anyone in the stadium to stand still, wear your warmest clothes for good measure!

If you can’t be a part of the banging atmosphere you can watch the The Billabong Air & Style on www.air-style.com/en/id-2012-billabong-air-style-innsbruck/live.html.

For more information log on www.air-style.com.

Check the videos and read the report from the finals of the Air&Style Beijing, where Ulrik Badertscher blew the field away with his signature backside 1260 double cork to claim the title.

After much debate about whether kicker contests were in danger of becoming back 10 fests (in our office at least), the first major 6-Star TTR event of the season exploded any fears with a frantic, varied and we’d have to say awesome display of next level jumping at the Beijing Air&Style.

Unfairly maligned for his backside 1620 nute that popped up a few years ago (Ok, it was to steeze what Fosters is to beer), Ulrik Badertscher showed what those in the know already could tell you – he is a very good snowboarder, with a unique style to boot, and is far from the freakish whirling dervish that 1620 clip suggested. The fact that he’s apparently Halldor Helgason‘s favourite snowboarder speaks volumes of what Ulrik’s riding’s all about. We’d had our brains baffled by Ulrik’s winning trick a few months ago when we printed a sequence of it in the print mag and had to struggle with naming it for the caption. The axes he goes through on that spin are unlike anything we’d seen – it’s not flat and not super corked, but there’s certainly a couple of dips in there – and to see him put them down time after time as clean as a whistle was quite something.

In many ways it was a funny contest. The stream didn’t kick in till after the qualis and the first round were done, so we didn’t get to see favourite Mark McMorris get put to the sword by Ståle Sandbech’s first ever contest backside 1440 in the first round but we were tuned in to see the almost unheard of sight of both Seb Toutant and Seppe Smits falling, and failing to make the last round. Toutant’s cab double 12 wasn’t enough to quench the flames of an on-fire Badertscher while Seppe even washed out of the regulation back 10 he opted for to try and scrape through his heat – to us it looked like he was hurting pretty bad from an awkward fall a hit or two prior to that. He didn’t look right, and Nils Arvidsson looked slightly embarrassed to sneak into the final in such a manner.

The final was an all-scando affair. Sandbech, Badertscher and the ludicrously smooth Torstein Horgmo were flying the flag for Norway while Arvidsson had to face down his noisy neighbours for the Swedes. After being the first rider to attempt a triple cork at the Oxborn Session a couple years back, you could tell that Nils was having a sniff of tripling the light fantastic on two of his three hits, but every time he pulled out after two inversions. Not putting anything down in such company was always going to leaving him in 4th. Ståle had landed his first ever backside 1440 earlier in the contest and figured the only way he could answer his compatriot’s tricks was to land one again, which he did, however the grab was gone after 900 leaving the last 540 a bit helicoptered, and the landing scruffed.

It really came down to Torstein vs Ulrik, and it must be said that for all the noise about double corks taking snowboarding in a bad direction, when they’re done the way Horgmo does ‘em their aesthetic quality would make angels sing. His switch frontside double 10s were so composed, so smooth, so darn lazy and so well stomped we thought he’d be scored higher, and then when on his final hit he pulled a regular front 10 dub and added in a fully intentional shifty we couldn’t help thinking the judges missed it.

Nevertheless, even if they did see it it wouldn’t probably have rained on Ulrik’s parade. That trick is so unique, stylish and he stomps it like it ain’t no thang. While the one he did to win was not his best, it was still enough to make it a great win for him and a fine-looking podium for Norway.

RESULTS

1 – Ulrik Badertscher
2 – Torstein Horgmo
3 – Ståle Sandbech
4 – Nils Arvidsson

Red Bull Best Trick
Ulrik Badertscher – Double corked backside 1260

Or to give it its full official title, who’ll win the “Oakley & Shaun White present Air&Style Beijing”? It’s going down tomorrow – December 3 2011 – in the Birds Nest Olympic Stadium from 12.30pm Euro time, but to add some spice to the proceedings we’re throwing it out to you to give your predictions, and someone will win some swag too.

You can watch the Beijing Air&Style live from around 12.30pm tomorrow and have all the action smack you in the chops while being entertained by our mate Henry who’ll be hosting the webcast. But we’ve already started having an office mass debate about who we think will win, so rather than bore you with our thoughts we thought we’d put it to the floor and see who you guys reckon will bag the TTR 6-Star title

To help you, we’ve scoured the internet for some examples of their skills. Turns out they’re all a bit tasty. Whodathunkit? Drop your prediction of who’ll walk away with the Ring of Glory in the comments and if you get it right and have luck with our Randomizer, we’ll send you an Onboard care package. You must post your prediction BEFORE THE CONTEST STARTS. We have ways of knowing if you cheat…

INVITED RIDERS

SEBASTIEN TOUTANT

MARK MCMORRIS

SEPPE SMITS

TORSTEIN HORGMO

NILS ARVIDSSON

MIKKEL BANG

ERIC WILLETT

ULRIK BADERTSCHER

MARKO GRILC

SAGE KOTSENBURG

ETHAN MORGAN

GJERMUND BRÅTEN

Or do you think one of the guys who’ll battle through the qualifiers will have enough to take it? There’s 4 spots in the main even for this lot: Jamie Nicholls, Ståle Sandbech, Torgeir Bergrem, Roope Tonteri, Kevin Backstrom, Petja Piiroinen, Yuki Kadono, Markku Koski, An Taehwan, Clemens Schattschneider and Charles Reid.

As we said, drop your tip for the title in the comments below  – BEFORE THE CONTEST STARTS – and we’ll pick a winner from the correct predictions on Monday.