New Zealand skier Nico Porteous has capped off an epic 2018 season by claiming the FIS Junior Freeski Halfpipe World Championships 2018 title at his home mountain of Cardrona Alpine Resort.
The 16-year-old, who claimed an Olympic bronze medal in PyeongChang earlier this year, went in to Winter Games NZ competition as the top qualifier. However, a deep landing on his switch 1080 on his first run of three initially had him sitting in second place behind Norway’s Birk Ruud.
Porteous came through with a 93.80 on his second attempt, cleaning everything up and executing a technical run with a left double 1260 and an alley-oop flat spin 540 on his last hit for the lead.
“This means a lot,” said Porteous. “It’s my first Junior World Champs and to come away with the win is really cool.
“It’s all about going forward from now on.”
Another local skier, Ben Harrington made a strong challenge for the podium, holding on to third place until the third last run of the day, when USA’s Dylan Ladd landed big back to back 900s at the top of the pipe and finished with a super technical double flat 900 down the pipe for a score of 92.80, pushing Harrington in to fourth place.