China’s Xu and Qi on top in Shimao Lotus Mountain
Dec 21, 2019·Freestyle
The 2019/20 FIS Freestyle Ski Aerials World Cup season kicked off in style on Saturday in Shimao Lotus Mountain with the Chinese veteran duo of Xu Mengtao and Qi Guangpu taking top spots on day 1 of back-to-back competitions scheduled for this weekend in China.
Coming back to Jilin province for the sixth of iteration of the event, the first day of action in Shimao Lotus Mountain lived up to expectations, with perfect bluebird skies and a stacked-field of athletes stomping big trick after big trick all day long.
After an exciting qualifications round that saw some of the favourites like Xu Sicun (CHN) and Wand Xindi (CHN) struggling to land their tricks, top 12 women and top 12 men qualified through into finals with two more rounds of jumps set to decide the first winners of the 2019/20 World Cup season.
In the ladies’ event Xu Mengtao picked up right where she left off last season, taking her second straight victory on the venue in Shimao Lotus Mountain. Despite of a slow start in the qualifications, it was a whole different story for the Chinese skiers in the finals, where she opted out to drop in the triple jumps.
In the first round of finals Xu went for her back Lay-Tuck-Full, and once the field was narrowed to just top-6 riders, Xu confidently stomped her back Lay-Full-Full and with a final score of 105.53 points she managed to kick off the new season exactly how she finished the previous one - with a yellow World Cup bib shining on her chest.
Second place on the day went to top qualifier Aliaksandra Ramanouskaya (BLR), who received 93.34 points for her back Lay-Full-Full.
Representing Australia Laura Peel completed the women’s podium in third place with a score of 86.65 points for her back Full-Tuck-Full, also earning her career’s tenth World Cup podium.
Also the men’s competition were full of top-notch aerials action with Qi Guangpu back in his winning ways in his first major competitions since 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games. But despite not competing for almost two years now, Qi looked super sharp throughout the day, impressing especially with his final jump of the competition. The 29-year-old veteran from China stomped his back double Full-Full-Full for a score 130.77 points in the big final, which was just enough to move him on top spot of the podium at the end of the day.
Jia Zongyang completed 1-2 podium punch for China in Shimao Lotus Mountain on Saturday, also competing in his first event since his remarkable silver medal performance at the 2018 Olympic Winter Games in PyeongChang. In the big final Jia stomped his back Full double Full-Full, for which he was awarded with 125.67 points and a second place on the day.
Noe Roth of Switzerland rounded out the men’s podium in third place with 113.57 points for his back double Full-Full-Full.
The aerials World Cup action in China is set to continue tomorrow with the team event. The individual round is slated to start at 9:10 LOC with the finals following up at 14:00.
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