Milan Big Air set to be bigger

The 2017-18 Big Air World Cup season will kick off this Saturday, November 11, 2017, with the Big Air and the City fest returning to Milan, Italy.

Following last year’s success, the event's second edition will once again be hosted at the 2015 World Expo site and right next to the iconic Tree of Life while marking a key chance to qualify for the 2018 Olympic Winter Games, where Big Air will make its much-anticipated debut.

As a result and with the road to PyeongChang closing in, some of the world's finest talents have registered for the season's first Big Air World Cup.

The women's field is led by defending Big Air World Cup title champion and reigning world champion Anna Gasser (AUT), 2014 Olympic Slopestyle gold medallist Jamie Anderson (USA) and Katie Ormerod (GBR), three riders who were able to grab at least one win in the last season.

However, as ladies's snowboarding is no longer being a one, two or three rider show, all of them will have to fend off strong competition from the likes of Canada's Spencer O’Brien and Laurie Blouin as well as Julia Marino (USA) and Klaudia Medlova (SLK).

While the women's competition will feature the defending Milan winner of last year (Gasser), Marcus Kleveland (NOR) is not set to return to Milan.

But there is a deep and strong men's field ready to take home the win with each of the riders having an arsenal of spins which can make the difference when it comes down to land some flawlessly executed tricks in the three runs, two best combined count final.

Last year's runner-up Seppe Smits (BEL) will be among the riders to watch out for and so are 2013 and 2015 world champion Roope Tonteri (FIN), Canada's Antoine Truchon and Michael Ciccarelli, Kyle Mack, Red Gerard and Eric Beauchemin from the USA, strong Russians Anton Mamaev and Vlad Khadarin as well as Sebbe de Buck (BEL) and Jonas Boesiger from Switzerland.

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Time schedule November 11, 2017

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• 10 AM CET: Men's qualifiers

• 1:50 PM CET: Ladies's qualifiers

• 7 PM CET: Ladies's and Men's finals

The latest programme can be checked .

Results and live scoring information will be available here.

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Viewing

• Europe and Asia: Eurosport

• USA: NBC Sports

• AUT: ORF Sport+

• CAN: CBC

• FRA, BEL, LUX: SFR3

• ITA: RAI Sport 1

• NOR: NRK3

• Highlights on FIS Snowboard Youtube following the event

• Highlights also on Facebook following the event

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Watch the Big Air riders talk about their Olympic debut last year in Milan:

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