Remind yourself of the tornado of super shredding that characterised contests in 2013-13 with this nice enough flashback at last season’s World Snowboard Tour. But we have to ask – why so few landings shown?

The 2012/13 World Snowboard Tour Season truly introduced a new level of competitive snowboarding. Triple Corks were the state of the art trick to take the top spots.

At the first 6 Star Event of the Season, the Air & Style in Beijing in December, Yuki Kadono took top honors with his Backside Triple Cork 1440. At the following O’Neill Evolution in January, in Davos, Switzerland it was up to Maxence Parrot to take first place with a Backside Triple Cork 1440. At the same event Kyle Mack came second, as he attempted to beat Maxence with a Triple Rodeo Indy 1440 – a trick never performed in a contest before. The X Games in Aspen closely followed, where Mark McMorris gave a glance of his incredible level of riding and defended his Gold medal title in Slopestyle with the highest ever score in X Games Slopestyle history with 98 points, finishing with a Triple Cork 1440 on the last jump.

At the Air & Style in the Bergisel Stadium, Innsbruck it was Eric Willett who won the Ring of Glory with a Switch Backside 1260 Mute. Though, in the rounds before, Mark McMorris and Stale Sandbech brought the Highlight Runs, with their Backside Triples, but unfortunately they couldn’t keep up that level leading into the Superfinals. In addition to the great show, Sebastien Toutant was crowned World Snowboard Tour Big Air Champion that day. At the Burton European Open in Laax it was Torstein Horgmo who won, still he couldn’t show his Triple, as the Finals had to be cancelled due to the worsening weather conditions.

The Burton US Open in Vail, Colorado at the End of February crowned Mark McMorris first, which made him the World Snowboard Tour Slopestyle Champion. On the women’s competitions it was Sarka Pancochova who had shown a truly solid level of riding and was crowned with not one but two World Snowboard Tour Champion Titles: Overall as well as Slopestyle. Kelly Clark was crowned World Snowboard Tour Halfpipe Champion as in the year before. The men’s World Snowboard Tour Halfpipe Title was given to young gun and big talent Ayumu Hirano. At the last Event of the 2012/13 Season it was the battle between Stale Sandbech and Peetu Piiroinen for the last remaining Title: World Snowboard Tour Overall Champion which finally went to Peetu again for the fourth time.

Already kicked off with the first 6 Star event, the X Games in Tignes (FRA), the 2013/14 Season promises to be another great one. Be sure to expect further progression and highlights in the upcoming winter.

www.worldsnowboardtour.com

The World Rookie Fest has been grooming snowboarding’s future stars for global domination for many years now. Guys that are now at the top of the game – like Peetu Piiroinen, Gjermund Braaten and Ståle Sandbech – have announced themselves by winning the WRF as groms and ahead of this season’s World Rookie Finals in Ischgl this edit looks at the impact it had on their careers.

The best rookies from all over the world are landing today in Ischgl, Austria, for the 2013 Volkl World Rookie Finals where the annual World Rookie Champion titles will be awarded. It is a great honor to join this legendary event, where all the rising stars challenge, and if you look at last years results from this event, you will notice that all the past seasons winners, today are among the invited riders at the 2013 Europe X-Games in Tignes.

The Black Yeti visited the 2013 X-Games in Tignes driving his brand new Jeep Wrangler and talked with some of the “past Rookie Fest riders” about the development of their snowboard carrier. Some of them competed in past edition of the World Rookie Fest and now are in the 10 top positions of the TTR World Snowboard Ranking and join world class events.

“If not for the World Rookie Fest I don’t think I would be here” sayed Gjermund Braaten, formed World Rookie Champion in 2006, from the rider lounge at the X-Games in Tignes. “Go to the Rookie Fest, do good, and if you end in the top 3 then you gonna be a star!” ended Gjermund.

These are some of past years World Rookie Champions and winner of the World Rookie Tour events competed at the 2013 Euro X Games:

Peetu Piiroinen (World Rookie Champion 2004)
Christian Haller (World Rookie Champion 2006)
Ulrik Badertscher (winner at the World Rookie Fest in Livigno 2006)
Gjermund Braaten (World Rookie Champion 2008)
Yuki Kadono (2nd place World Rookie Finals 2012)
Staale Sandbech (grom winner at the World Rookie Fest in Livigno 2009)
Seppe Smits (many partecipation at World Rookie Tour events)
Roope Tonteri (2 times World Rookie Champion in 2010 and 2011)
Sarka Pancochova (winner at the World Rookie Fest in Livigno 2008)

Cab 9s for days in this Burton Snowboards clip featuring Danny Davis, Mikkel Bang, Marko Grilc, Christian Haller, Mark McMorris, Seppe Smits, Peetu Piiroinen, and Roope Tonteri. Flat spins, cork spins, double cork spins, and even Seppe’s crazy spin-rewind thing all look good during these spring park sessions from last season.

Last week, yours truly Onboard Magazine travelled to the Austrian valley of Montafon for an all-new event concept called Nike Snake & Hammers. Nike and the Montafon had conjured up a banked slalom cum slopestyle course that was open to everyone who felt like a few fast turns, slow spins, and slushy transitions. The aim was to snake down course as fast as possible while dropping their best „hammers“ along the way. The course was a combination of numerous turns and banks, the park included a stairset, side by side kicker setup, big bowl, a gap through a snow tunnel to a straight rail, a creative halfpipe and a small hip. In our humble opinion, it was the laid-back park design that made the event stand out, as punters, media, and pros alike were eager to get their edges dug into the banked turns and snake pipe walls.

Stephan Maurer on course! Photo: Cyril Müller

Despite the challenging weather on the first three days (snowfalls and high fog) the vibe was outstanding, as the course was as inviting and fun to ride as it gets. On the day of the finals the sun came out, many pros and legends alike turned up and made for an unforgettable day on the mountain. Nike pros like Peetu Piiroinen, Jamie Nicholls, Kevin Backström and Spencer O’Brien were joined by an illustre crew of riders like David Bertschinger Karg, Enzo Nilo, Stephan Maurer, Nico Droz, David Benedek and Steve Gruber.

Peetu Piiroinen is attracted to big kickers. Phto: Cyril Müller

When the judging was complete on the day of the finals, Christian Haller (SUI) showed he had the best mix of balance, speed and tricks winning him a share of the $10,000 prize purse. With a race time of 01:25,10, frontside lipslide on the gap downrail, frontside 720 tailgrab off the kicker and many other tricks he claimed a deserved win. Spencer O’Brien won the women’s contest by snaking down the course with her well documented power and style with the best hammer award going to Jamie Nicholls who threw a perfectly stomped backside 1080 off the kicker.

Snake & Hammers winner Christian Haller coming out of the tunnel of doom. Photo: Cyril Müller

MEN
1. Christian Haller / SUI 2. Stephan Maurer / SUI 3. Peetu Piiroinen / FIN

WOMEN
1. Spencer O’Brien / CAN 2. Nicola Thost / GER 3. Aline Bock / GER

BEST HAMMER: Jamie Nicholls / ENG

Further information about the contest and the complete ranking are published on www.snakeandhammers.com.

A bird’s eye view of the park. Photo: Cyril Müller

Check the video recap of what went down in Montafon when the Swoosh combined banked slalom with slopestyle. Hint: Radness.

Remember the rather sexy Nike Chosen Sessions around this time last year in Montafon? Well, the Swoosh crew revisited that zone again last week but spun the park in a new and novel manner, crafting a banked slalom/slopestyle ultra mega hybrid Frankenpark. Christian Haller‘s combined time x trick score was highest and he duly bagged the win ahead of Stephan Maurer and Peetu Piiroinen. This is probably what snowboarding at the Olympics should really look like.

1. Sebastien Toutant

2. Mark McMorris

3. Peetu Piiroinen

1. Torstein Horgmo

2. Mark McMorris

3. Sebastien Toutant

4. Peetu Piiroinen

5. Eric Willet

6. Gjermund Bråten

7. Sage Kotsenburg

8. Ståle Sandbech

Check this. Another rad look at the winners from the recent Arctic Challenge and how the overall World Snowboard Tour was decided. Contains more AYUMU, and therefore viewing is mandatory…

Peetu was recently crowned the overall winner of the World Snowboard Tour for a record fourth time. Check this compilation of some of his riding highlights, along with chat from the man himself…

For the 4th time, Peetu Piiroinen showed he is the most consistent overall rider on the tour. At last weekend’s Arctic Challenge, the Finn was crowned Overall World Snowboard Tour Champion 2012/13!

TAC 2013 – 1st – Iouri Podladtchikov

TAC 2013 – 2nd – Yiwei Zhang

TAC 2013 – 3rd – Ayumu Hirano

Overall World Snowboard Tour 12-13 Winner – Peetu Piiroinen

Here’s the World Snowboard Tour’s wrapup of proceedings at TAC, and at the Nescafe Champs that went down in Leysin at the same time.

At the final men’s Halfpipe event of the season, The Arctic Challenge, Peetu Piiroinen was crowned World Snowboard Tour Overall Champion in Oslo Vinterpark today. “It feels so incredible of course that I was still able to win the Overall title after Ståle got it last year. It’s just so hard nowadays, because the riding level in both Slope and Pipe is getting higher and higher. It’s a lot of work, if you want to be good in both disciplines. Ståle and I had a really good battle, unfortunately he didn’t make it to the final here at the Arctic Challenge, it would have been nice to battle it out till the end.” Peetu commented on his 4th World Snowboard Tour title.

After a steady season with 7 top 10 results and 2 podium places, Peetu beat his rival Ståle Sandbech, who had trouble with his flow in the first heat of the semi-finals. He couldn’t land as clean as we usually see him do in Pipe. Peetu came in 5th overall; he was surpassed by Iouri Podladtchikov (SUI), Chinese surprise Yiwei Zhang (CHN) and World Snowboard Tour Halfpipe Champion Ayumu Hirano (JPN).
 
As one of the favourites for the Arctic Challenge title, Iouri took the win with his second final run, laying down a Frontside 900 Tail Grab, Backside 900 Mute Grab – Frontside 1080 Tail Grab to Cab 1080 Double Cork Mute Grab and finally a Frontside 1080 Double Cork Truckdriver, scoring 90.28 points. With the last run in reversed order, first placed Iouri had to lay down his last run first, only scoring a 58.85. He followed the competition trying to beat his score from the hot seat.
Iouri commented: “The Arctic Challenge is a contest that I used to wait for, because it’s always been in the end of the season and it’s always been on a high level; of technical difficulty and also a high level on style. I am very proud that we still represent that today; really represent snowboarding the way that it should be – for example those big Backside Airs and some really really good grabs that you don’t see often, that’s important to me. And to be the winner right now is just insane! I’m excited to ride more contests with Ayumu in it; he’ll obviously be there in the future. There are not too many riders that have a little bit of skate style. I’m a skater and he’s a skater. I really like to watch people that have a little bit of skate style in their riding. So excited about that, and I hope that he’ll develop his tricks even more.”

Second sensation of the evening was Chinese Yiwei Zhang from Harbin, China. With the next World Championships of Snowboarding moving from Oslo to Yabuli in 2016, Yiwei received a wildcard to ride the Arctic Challenge and fully exploited the opportunity to show his amazing ability here. With a very impressive final run consisting of a huge Backside Air to Frontside 1080 Double Cork Frontside Grab – Cab 1080 Double Cork Stalefish -Double Crippler Frontside Grab, he captivated the Vinterpark crowd.
 
Landing his final 6Star event on the podium, Ayumu Hirano casually picked up the trophy for his already awarded World Snowboard Tour Halfpipe title, happy as ever.
 
The World Snowboard Tour 12-13 came to an end here today, but at the same time the 5Star Nescafe Champs marked the first Slopestyle event of the new 201314 season. Nescafé Champs 2013 podium:

Men                           
1. Janne Korpi
2. Spencer Link
3. Scott Moline

Women
1. Ty Walker
2. Jordie Karlinski
3. Phoebe Novelle

Riders have the chance to stock up on World Snowboard Tour points in different disciplines early this season, giving them a head start before a packed winter schedule with the Olympics in Sochi, Russia is on the horizon.
 
With the 5Star Spring Battle in Flachauwinkl, Austria on next weekend, and the first 6Star event X Games Tignes from 20th till 22nd of March, the best action in snowboarding is guaranteed for spring.