Peel and Roth secure titles with victories in Krasnoyarsk
Mar 08, 2020·Freestyle
Another fantastic competition in Krasnoyarsk went down in style on Sunday night, with Australia’s Laura Peel and Switzerland’s Noe Roth taking huge victories in the competition while clinching the respective women’s and men’s 2019/20 FIS Freestyle Ski Aerials World Cup titles in the process.
After a successful dual moguls showdown on Saturday, the FIS Freestyle Ski World Cup was once again in full swing on Sunday in a highly-contested aerials competition - the seventh and the final event on the 2019/20 World Cup tour. And with a handful of athletes still within the reach for the season’s titles, the anticipation ahead of the evening’s finals under the lights was sky-high.
And, fittingly, the competition in Krasnoyarsk did not disappoint, as the world’s best aerials athletes kept throwing big spins one after another, wrapping up the 2019/20 aerials World Cup season in an extraordinary fashion.
In the women’s event Laura Peel grabbed her second victory of the season to put the icing on the cake of the most successful season of her career, as the 30-year-old member of the “Flying Kangaroos” team clinched her first aerials World Cup crystal globe. It took Peel almost 10 years of competing on the World Cup tour to finally finish the season on the number one spot.
Before Sunday’s competition Peel was sitting just 44 points above China’s Xu Mengtao in the women’s World Cup ranking, so it was all up to those couple of final jumps of the season deciding who would take home the title.
As soon as Xu failed to land her trick in the first round of finals and didn’t make the cut into the final top-6, it was all clear that it will be Peel walking away victorious. However, despite securing the crystal globe in the middle of the competition, Peel still went all-in and stepped it up on her final attempt on the day. Dropping as the last athlete in the women’s competition, the Aussie skier stomped her full-tuck-full to land on top of the podium with a final score of 96.99 points.
“It’s hard to put it into words at the moment,” said Peel, “I honestly couldn’t be happier right now. It’s my first globe and it’s been almost 10 years working towards it. I have a great team around me and I’m super stoked with the result today.”
Second place on the day went to Xu Sicun of China, who received 95.86 points for her lay-full-full, while Ashley Caldwell of USA rounded out the women’s podium in third place with 88.83 points for her full-double full.
In the final aerials World Cup standing Peel led the way with 469 points, with Xu finishing the season in second place with 351 points. Aliaksandra Ramanouskaya of Belarus completed the 2019/20 aerials podium in third place with 260 points.
Over on the men’s side of things, Noe Roth reached for his long-awaited career’s first World Cup victory, wrapping up his 2019/20 campaign in extraordinary fashion while also taking home the World Cup’s biggest honour in the crystal globe.
In the big final of the Sunday’s competition Roth managed to deal with extremely high pressure from Russia’s own Maxim Burov and Pavel Krotov, both of whom not only wanted to perform well in front of their home Russian crowd, but both of whom were also pushing to move ahead of Roth in the final World Cup standing and the steal the globe from him.
The Swiss aerial skier put it down when it counted the most, landing his double full-double full-full for a final score of 127.40 points. However, although Roth gave it everything he had, he would have to wait tensely for the final result, as Burov was still left to drop in as the last athlete of the day.
In his final jump Burov decided to step things up a notch on a difficulty level with his double full-full-double full. And while he looked flawless in the air, he couldn’t quite put that one down cleanly, landing with a significant hand-drag that would ensure the victory and the 2019/20 World Cup title for the 19-year-old Roth.
“It feels amazing,” said Roth, “I don’t even know what to say right now... My first World Cup victory and the crystal globe at the same time. It’s insane and I’m so happy.”
Pavel Krotov finished the competition in second place with 124.43 points for his full-full-double full, while Canada’s Lewis Irving completed the men’s podium in third place with a final score of 116.29 for his full-full-full.
In the overall men’s aerials ranking Roth took the top spot with 386 points. Krotov finished behind the Swiss athlete in second place with 334 points, while his compatriot Maxim Burov rounded out the season’s top-3 in third place with 323 points.
As the 2019/20 wrapped up in Krasnoyarsk, Russia’s Sofia Alekseeva and Switzerland’s Pirmin Werner were awarded the Rookie of the Year awards, while China yet once again topped the Nations Cups standing.
With the aerials season now officially in the books, the FIS Freestyle Ski World Cup tour is gearing up for two final competitions of the 2019/20 moguls campaign, which take to to the slopes of Idre Fjäll (SWE) next weekend, March 14-15.
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