Snowboard slopestyle and big air preview

However, snowboarding is all about moving forward, and there’s a fresh crop of riders who have made their way into the snowboarding elite in the last couple of years, with Zoe Sadwoski-Synnott (NZL) leading the way.

Sadowski-Synnott showed a flash of what she was capable of back in PyeongChang when she claimed big air bronze at just 17 years of age.

However, it’s in the last two seasons that the now 21-year-old has truly taken things to the next level, and she comes into Beijing 2022 as the reigning slopestyle World Champion and as a double gold medallist from the most recent iteration of the X Games, when she took top spot in big air and made history in slopestyle by becoming the first woman to land back-to-back double corks in a slopestyle run.

Throw in a Dew Tour win from back in December, and on the women’s side of things it’s looking like it’s Zoi Sadowski-Synnott’s world and everybody else is just living in it right now.

Another to watch from south of the equator is Australia’s Tess Coady, who took top spot in the Laax Open two weeks ago to launch herself into the Beijing podium conversation. The 21-year-old Coady, along with the teenage Japanese tandem of Reira Iwabuchi and Kokomo Murase, and up-and-comers like Annika Morgan (GER), Melissa Pepperkamp (NED) and Evy Poppe (BEL) should be right there alongside Sadowski-Synnott to push the old guard to the limits in Beijing.

THE RIDERS – MEN

PyeongChang 2018 men’s slopestyle podium

GOLD – Red Gerard (USA)

SILVER – Max Parrot (CAN)

BRONZE – Mark McMorris (CAN)

PyeongChang 2018 men’s big air podium

GOLD – Sebastien Toutant (CAN)

SILVER – Kyle Mack (USA)

BRONZE – Billy Morgan (GBR)

Where to start with the men…

First off, we can tell you that in all the slopestyle and big air World Cup competitions in the past decade, only two men have been able to claim back-to-back wins – Canada’s Max Parrot, who took two big air wins in a row back in the 2015/16 season, and Marcus Kleveland of Norway, who took slopestyle wins in Aspen (USA) and Silvaplana (SUI) last winter to close out his double crystal globe-winning season in style.