Explosive end to Park & Pipe World Cup season in Silvpalana
Mar 23, 2024·Snowboard Park & Pipe
The 2023/24 Park & Pipe World Cup season went into the history books on a heater at Silvaplana on Saturday, with Japan’s Reira Iwabuchi claiming her first slopestyle World Cup win in three years for the women and Liam Brearley taking the W on the men’s side to become the first Canadian to claim the slopestyle crystal globe in World Cup history.
Finishing in second place in Saturday’s women’s competition was Iwabuchi’s teammate Kokomo Murase, doing more than enough to claim both the slopestyle and Park & Pipe overall crystal globes on the women’s side for the second time in her career.
For the men, meanwhile, it was Australia’s Valentino Guseli landing in third place on Saturday’s podium to vault himself into top spot on the Park & Pipe rankings, giving the 18-year-old his second straight overall crystal globe.
IWABUCHI LEADS THE WAY IN YET ANOTHER BIG DAY FOR JAPAN
Iwabuchi lead off her 79.62-scoring winning second run with a frontside 270 on 270 out on the down rail, before sending a switch backside 540 melon on the hip jump, and then going through the big jump line with a frontside double cork 900 indy, cab 900 with a tickled melon grab attempt, and then a big backside 1080 melon on the final tabletop. The 22-year-old would then pop a melon on the quarterpipe before finishing things off with a 50-50 to frontside 180 out on the rainbow rail.
“I’m super happy to be back here in Silvaplana and back on top of the podium,” Iwabuchi said after the awards ceremony, referencing her previous victory in Silvaplana back in the 2020/21 season, “I’ve been getting more confidence again and training hard with my coach, and I’m happy for the win.”
Iwabuchi’s victory was yet another in long line of them for the Japanese team in 2023/24, as they took 13 out of a possible 24 victories across all the slopestyle, big air and halfpipe World Cup women’s and men’s competitions to go down this season. Needless to say, the Japanese team walked away with this season’s Park & Pipe Nations Cup trophy in a landslide once again.
Also more than doing her part to help the Japanese cause throughout the season was Murase who, with three victories and the Silvaplana second place finish in her four starts, was able to lock down both the slopestyle and the Park & Pipe overall globes, matching her feat from the 2021/22 season.
As well as her World Cup success, Murase was also the winner of three medals at the 2024 X Games and the stomper of a handful of never-been-done-in-competition-tricks in 2023/24. It’s safe to say that the season the 19-year-old put together goes down as one of the greatest campaigns in freestyle snowboard competition history, and she is only getting better.
“I’m super happy to win two crystal globes again,” Murase said through a translator, “I finished on the podium in every competition this season, so I’m pretty satisfied. I had a great season.”
On the final slopestyle World Cup rankings it would be Iwabuchi taking second place behind Murase, while Germany’s Annika Morgan would earn the bronze medal for third place on the season podium.
Meanwhile, in the women’s Park & Pipe overall it would be a clean sweep for the Japanese squad, as halfpipe crystal globe winner Mitsuki Ono would end up second overall, with Iwabuchi making her third trip to the podium of the day’s awards ceremony with a third place overall finish.
BREARLEY ADDS CRYSTAL GLOBE TO SEASON’S HARDWARE HAUL
Over on the men’s side of things Liam Brearley capped off an outstanding 2023/24 season with a superlative top-to-bottom run on the dynamic Silvaplana course, bringing technical rail tricks, four-way spinning, a wide variety of grabs and big amplitude, and doing it all with the silky smoothness that has become one of this riding’s defining characteristics.
Brearley lead off his 88.10-scoring second run with a cab 270 on 270 off on the flat tube, before going noseslide backside switchup to forward on the down-flat-down. Over the hip jump he then went frontside double cork 900 truckdriver, before going switch backside 1260 melon, backside 1620 melon, switch frontside 1440 tail grab through the jumps, and then blowing the roof of Corvatsch course with a massive switch frontside 720 stalefish to melon grab, and then finishing it all off full a fully-locked frontside 270 on 450 off on the rainbow rail.
With the win, Brearley was able to leapfrog Japan’s Ryoma Kimata into top spot on the men’s slopestyle final rankings, making the 21-year-old the first Canadian to win a slopestyle crystal globe in World Cup history.
When you consider the wealth of talent the Canadian team has had at their disposal over the 15 years of slopestyle World Cup action, it was understandably a bit of a surprise for Brearley to learn the history he had made.
“It’s really crazy,” Brearley said with his globe in hand, “I really thought one of the Canadian squad would have done it before me. I had no clue about that coming into this contest. But it’s super sick to be the first one and I’m glad I could do it here. This is my favourite course of the year, every year, and to finally win this one is just super sick. I’m glad I could get it done.”
With his win on Saturday, a win at the Laax Open slopestyle World Cup, X Games knucklehuck gold, and a win in streetstyle competition at Dew Tour, Brearley put together a season that has cemented his place amongst the absolute top tier of snowboarders on the planet.
With his runner-up finish for the men in Saturday’s Silvaplana competition, Hasegawa would end up finishing behind Brearley and Kimata in third place on the 2023/24 slopestyle World Cup rankings.
Meanwhile, Silvaplana third place finisher Valentino Guseli would take a page out of Brearley’s book, utilising a big performance in the final competition of the season to move up the standings and snatch a crystal globe away from Ryoma Kimata.
Guseli came into into competition in Silvaplana in second place behind Kimata on the men’s Park & Pipe overall rankings, and when Kimata failed to make it through to finals Guseli knew a strong performance on Saturday would put the big trophy in his hand for the second straight season. With his podium on Saturday he managed just that.
“It’s pretty crazy,” Guseli said with his second career overall crystal globe in hand, “This morning my dad texted me a photo of two of the globes that I already have out on the balcony with the sea in the background at home, and he said ‘They’re waiting for another one.’ So that was the goal of the day, to get this.
“Before I dropped for my second run I was pretty sure that I had done enough to win the globe already, but also I wanted to win the comp. So I went out and I put down my best run. I didn’t win the comp, but that got me on the podium, which I’m happy with and it made the globe a certainty.”
Kimata would be forced to again settle for second place on the standings, while his Japanese countryman Ruka Hirano, winner of the halfpipe crystal globe, would finish in third.
While the FIS Snowboard Park & Pipe World Cup season may be over there’s still plenty of competition left before the summer fully sets in, including Freeski World Cup finals here in Silvaplana on Sunday, before we turn our attention to the big air and slopestyle Junior World Championships, set to drop in on Livigno (ITA) next week.
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