Gu and Ferreira unbeatable to start halfpipe season
Dec 16, 2023·Freeski Park & Pipe
A near-perfect day of weather and one of the best pipes we’ve seen at Copper Mountain lead to one of the most exciting halfpipe World Cup competitions in recent memory on Friday afternoon at the Toyota U.S. Grand Prix, where Eileen Gu (CHN) and Alex Ferreira (USA) each claimed their second-straight World Cup wins to start the season, with Ferreira leading a U.S. sweep of the podium.
GU MAKES IT TWO-FOR-TWO SO FAR IN 2023/24
As with any competition she enters, Gu came into Friday as the favourite despite finishing in second place behind Zoe Atkin (GBR) in Wednesday’s qualifications, and the 20-year-old did not disappoint come time for the big show.
Gu stomped all three of her runs on Friday, with each one scoring well into the 90-point range and each one strong enough to give her a victory.
The best of the bunch was run two, where Gu lead off with a 900-to-900 combo - right 900 Buick, left 900 Japan - before going into a right 720 lead tail, sthen witch left 360 Japan, and then a left alley-oop flat 5 mute, and then mirroring that to finish up with a right alley-oop flat 5 safety, skiing out to a score of 95.75 and her ninth-straight World Cup halfpipe victory.
“I’m so grateful to be here today,” said Gu, who’s currently battling through a shoulder injury that may eventually require surgery, “Every day that I have on snow whether it’s just making finals or being on the podium or winning any contests, I never take anything for granted. I’m grateful for every single win that I have and I’m as hungry as ever. Let’s keep it going!”
As with last weekend’s halfpipe World Cup in Secret Garden, runner-up to Gu on Friday was the USA’s Hanna Faulhaber, who had her signature amplitude on display once more put upped the stakes with the final hit of her second run.
Leading off that run with her the massive tail grab that has become her trademark, Faulhaber then went left 900 safety, right flair 540 safety, left 720 mute, and then switch right cork 720 Japan, before finishing things off with a huge left 1080 safety. Add it all up and you’ve got a score of 92.00 and Faulhaber’s first World Cup podium on home soil.
Finishing up in third place on the women’s podium was Atkin, who once again charged the Copper pipe hard but couldn’t quite re-create the magic of her qualification run.
Atkin started her 91.00 scoring first run with a left 540 mute into a right 720 lead tail, then going switch left 720 Japan, right 540 lead tail, right alley-oop 360 Japan and finally a switch right 720 lead tail to earn her fourth career World Cup podium.
FERREIRA FIRING TO LEAD U.S. MEN’S SWEEP
Over on the men’s side of things Alex Ferrera made it clear he’s on a mission this season, as the 13-season World Cup veteran once again put down a series of heavy runs to make it clear that he’s the frontrunner for what could be the second crystal globe of his career.
Ferreira’s first run would score him an astronomical 97.00 that would hold throughout the rest of the competition.
The run began with a switch left 1080 blunt grab, then into an insane right double 1620 safety, a left 1080 tail, and then a switch right double 1080 Japan, before dropping his second 1620 of the run with a left double 1620 cindy.
“It was an absolutely amazing day,” Ferreira said just before taking a group photo with the rest of the hugely successful U.S. squad at the bottom of the pipe, “We have such a stacked team, and to be able to ski like I did today and do my absolute best in front of all these fans is unbelievable.
“I’m so, so grateful to Copper Mountain, to FIS, to every one of my teammates, coaches, wax techs…everybody.”
Following up Ferreira in the U.S. sweep was Hunter Hess, who followed up what was his first podium in five years last weekend in Secret Garden by making it two in a row with the sort of ragged grace that is his signature.
Hess opened up his 95.00-point scoring second run with a wwitch left corked 540 safety, into a switch right 1080 reverse mute, then a left double 1260 Japan, a right double 1260 double Japan, and finally the left misty 540 mute that he does in such an inimitable way that the trick may need it’s own Hunter Hess-banded name.
Third place for the home-squad sweep went to last season’s crystal globe winner Birk Irving, who grabbed a piece of the podium in his season debut with a third run that saw him open with a switch left 900 nose, into a switch right 720 mute, and then a left double 1260 safety to Japan, a right double 1260 Japan, and finally a left down the pipe double 720 safety for a score of 92.50 and the seventh podium of his World Cup career.
While we’ve been saying that the U.S. team swept the podium, the host team in fact took all five top places on Friday’s results, with Nick Goepper finishing in fourth place to make an astonishingly successful halfpipe World Cup debut after retiring from slopestyle competition at the end of last season, and David Wise returning from a knee injury suffered at the World Champs in Bakuriani last season to show he’s still got plenty left in the tank with a fifth place finish.
With halfpipe competition in the books at Copper we now shift our attention over to the big jump for Saturday, where Visa Big Air World Cup action gets underway beginning at 10:00 MT.
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