Sunny Silvaplana set to host Freeski World Cup finale

Way down the World Cup rankings but quite clearly one to watch is Mathilde Gremaud (SUI), the Beijing 2022 slopestyle gold medallist. Gremaud hasn’t had a much of a World Cup season to speak of, with only one start thus far, but with her gold in China and a runner-up finish at the 2022 X Games behind Ledeux, she’s done more than enough in 2021/22 to maintain her status amongst the world’s elite.

With the likes of Kirsty Muir (GBR), Johanne Killi (NOR), Silvia Bertagna (ITA) and many others on hand in in Silvaplan the list of strong contenders goes long on the women’s side of things for the final World Cup of the season.

RUUD REACHING FOR FREESKI OVERALL, RAGETTLI CHASING FIFTH CAREER GLOBE

Over on the men’s startlist it’s tough to know exactly where to start, with 60 skiers ready to drop in and in a head-spinning number of them capable of landing in the top-3 once the scores are all tallied on Saturday afternoon.

Probably the easiest place to begin, however, is with Norway’s Birk Ruud, the Beijing 2022 Olympic big air gold medallist, leader of the men’s Freeski overall World Cup standings, and second place on the slopestyle rankings.

Ruud is fresh off taking the win in a weather-shortened Tignes slopestyle World Cup two weekends ago, where his top-qualifying score stood up as the winner after finals were cancelled due to wind.

Ruud missed last season’s Silvaplana competition due to personal reasons, and the season before that he finished just off the podium in fourth place here, so expect the 21-year-old to come out swinging this time around as he looks to lock down the overall globe and maybe, just maybe, snag the slopestyle trophy while he’s at it.

The last part of that equation won’t be an easy one to achieve, however, with the most successful freeskier in World Cup history sitting 50 points above him on the rankings, as Switzerland’s own Andri Ragettli looks to lock down what would be the eighth globe of his career.