Park & Pipe elite look to cap epic season with Engadin 2025 World Championships hardware
Mar 19, 2025·Snowboard Park & Pipe)
The snowboard slopestyle, big air and halfpipe events at the upcoming 2025 World Championships in Engadin are shaping up to be a star-packed showdown between Crystal Globe and World Cup winners, Olympic medallists, and reigning and former World Champions.
Slopestyle qualifications beginning on Thursday 20 March will be the first of the snowboard Park & Pipe program at the 2025 FIS Snowboard, Freestyle and Freeski World Championships in Engadin, Switzerland.
Great Britain’s Mia Brookes is the defending slopestyle World Champion as well as the 2024/25 overall women Crystal Globe winner, and the big air Globe winner.
The 18-year-old comes to Engadin after amassing seven World Cup podium finishes out of a possible eight across big air and slopestyle during the 2024/25 FIS season.
New Zealand’s Zoi Sadowski-Synnott, however, beat Brookes to the slopestyle Globe by a mere 12 points in a spectacular return to form after battling injuries for more than a year.
The 24-year-old Beijing 2022 Olympic Winter Games slopestyle champion has delivered an incredible run of performances in 2025, including back-to-back World Cup victories in Aspen in February in slopestyle and big air.
Sadowski-Synnott also claimed second place in slopestyle at the Laax Open in January, followed by X Games slopestyle gold and big air bronze, also in Aspen in January.
Brookes claimed X Games slopestyle bronze behind silver medallist Kokomo Murase (JPN) – who will also compete in Engadin – and narrowly missed the X Games big air podium with fourth place behind Sadowski-Synnott’s bronze.
Sadowski-Synnott was the 2021 World Champion and runner-up to Brookes in 2023 in Bakuriani (GEO), and Engadin will be an Olympic reunion of sorts for the New Zealander’s slopestyle rivals, with the Beijing 2022 slopestyle silver medallist Julia Marino (USA) and bronze medallist Tess Coady (AUS) also on the start list.
Coady will be hoping to build on her previous two World Championships podiums where she finished third in slopestyle in 2021 and third in big air in 2023. The 24-year-old Australian also narrowly missed out on slopestyle bronze in 2023 with fourth place.
Reigning big air World Champion Anna Gasser (AUT) is also contesting slopestyle in Engadin, but the last time she claimed a World Championships podium in slopestyle was in 2015 as runner-up. In big air, the 33-year-old is the most successful World Cup rider of all time with 20 podium finishes, including 10 wins.
Her long list of big air achievements include two Olympic gold medals from Beijing 2022 and the PyeongChang 2018 Games, and two World Championships titles from 2017 and 2023. More recently, Gasser ended her 2024/25 World Cup season with one victory and one third place finish out of four big air events.
In men’s slopestyle, the field of 62 will be eager to hit the Engadin course after men’s competition at the fifth and final event of the 2024/25 season in Flachau (AUT) was cancelled at the last minute due to weather conditions.
The men’s slopestyle standings were subsequently based on four World Cup events rather than five, with Canadian Cameron Spalding taking the Crystal Globe to give Canada its second consecutive slopestyle season trophy after countryman Liam Brearley took the honours in 2023/24. Spalding and Brearley will be joined in Engadin by fellow Canadian Mark McMorris, the 2021 big air World Champion who recently claimed 2025 X Games slopestyle silver behind Red Gerard (USA) in January.
The man to beat in slopestyle at the World Championships, however, is 2021 and 2023 winner Marcus Kleveland (NOR) – and reigning big air World Champion Taiga Hasegawa has already stated he wants to be slopestyle and big air World Champion by competition’s end.
The in-form Hasegawa comes to Engadin after wrapping up his 2024/25 World Cup season with two Crystal Globe trophies; in big air and the overall men’s Park & Pipe standings.
While the big air start list is yet to be confirmed at the time of publishing, Hasegawa is well placed to contest both slopestyle and big air, as is Kleveland, who was third on the Aspen 2021 big air podium alongside his slopestyle gold at the same World Championships.
The halfpipe start lists will undoubtedly feature fewer crossovers compared to slopestyle and big air, although both reigning World Champions appeared to find form during the 2024/25 World Cup season.
Women’s reigning halfpipe World Champion Cai Xuetong (CHN) counts two second place finishes out of four World Cup starts in the 2024/25 season, although she narrowly missed out on a third podium with fourth place in Calgary in February.
Meanwhile, U.S. rider Maddie Mastro won the halfpipe Crystal Globe after amassing three podiums, including one victory, from five starts.
Fellow U.S. snowboarder and two-time Olympic halfpipe champion Chloe Kim boasts two World Championships titles, the first as a 19-year-old in 2019, and the second from 2021, both in front of home crowds in Park City and Aspen. Mastro was runner-up to Kim in 2021, and third behind Cai in 2019. Neither Mastro nor Kim competed at the 2023 edition.
Alongside those well-established names, look to the likes of fast-rising stars Gaon Choi (KOR), Sara Shimizu (JPN) and Rise Kudo – 16, 15 and 15 years old respectively – to make some noise this World Champs go-around in Engadin.
In men’s halfpipe, reigning World Champion Lee Chaeun (KOR) recently won gold in slopestyle at the Harbin 2025 Asian Winter Games in February.
His best result in the 2024/25 World Cup season, however, was fifth place in Copper in December, although the 18-year-old topped those qualifications.
Japan’s Ruka Hirano took home the halfpipe Crystal Globe with a total of four podiums from five World Cup starts, including two victories. At the World Championships, Hirano’s best result from three editions was fourth in 2023, compared to 12th and 13th in 2021 and 2019 respectively.
Fellow Japanese rider Yuto Totsuka, 23, was the 2021 World Champion while Australia’s Scotty James was runner-up after three consecutive editions as World Champion in 2019, 2017 and 2015.
In more recent times, James won X Games superpipe gold in January while Totsuka was runner-up. Beijing 2022 halfpipe champion Ayumu Hirano claimed bronze.
The halfpipe finals on Saturday 29 March will wrap up snowboard competition at the Engadin 2025 FIS Snowboard, Freestyle and Freeski World Championships.
QUICK LINKS
FIS Snowboard World Championships data page (start lists, live scoring, results)
Video highlights (coming soon)
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