Canadians big on heart, short on medals
Despite strong performances at the FIS World Snowboarding Championships at Kreischberg, Austria last week, the only Canadian to return home with a piece of hardware was North Vancouver and Whistler rider Drew Neilson.
In the snowboard cross on Jan. 20, Neilson was solid in the qualifiers and in the elimination rounds to qualify for the finals. He wound up third. The top spot went to Xavier Delerue of France, followed by Seth Wescott of the U.S.
Also for Canada, Francois Boivin was 14 th , Jaysey-Jay Anderson 17 th and Ben Wainwright 28 th .
In the women’s event, Karine Ruby of France took the world championship, followed by Ursula Fingerlos of Austria and Victoria Wicky of France. Whistler’s Dominique Vallee was 15 th for Canada.
In the big air, the top three spots went to Risto Mattila of Finland, Simon Ax of Sweden and Antti Autti of Finland. Neil Connolly was the top Canadian in 21 st .
In the halfpipe, Vallee just missed the podium, finishing in fourth place overall. North Vancouver’s Maelle Ricker, who is still recovering from a knee injury, landed in seventh place with the help of a cortisone injection. Whistler’s Lori Glazier was 10th, and Mercedes Nicoll was 19 th .
The top three spots went to Doriane Vidal of France, followed by Nicola Pederzolli of Austria and Fabienne Reuteler of Switzerland.
In the men’s pipe, Brett Carpentier of Quebec was the top Canadian in sixth place. Whistler’s Crispin Lipscomb was 15 th , Guillaume Morisset was 21 st and Neil Connolly was 26 th .
The men’s podium went to Markus Keller of Switzlerland, followed by Stefan Karlsson of Sweden and Steven Fisher of the U.S.
Jasey-Jay Anderson was the top Canadian in the parallel slalom in 12 th place overall. The day before he was 23 rd in the parallel giant slalom.
Jerome Sylvestre was 21 st in the parallel slalom and 13 th in the PGS, and Francois Boivin was 36 th and 22 nd respectively.
The parallel slalom went to Siegfried Grabner of Austria, followed by Mathieu Bozzetto of France and Simon Schoch of Switzerland.
Schoch also placed second in the PGS, behind Dejan Kosir of Slovenia and ahead of Nicolas Huet of France.
In the women’s parallel slalom, Isabelle Blanc and Karine Ruby of France took the top two spots, followed by Sara Fischer of Sweden. Helene Cloutier was the top Canadian in 27 th .
The women’s PGS went to Ursula Bruhin of Switzlerland, followed by Julie Pomagalski of France and Heidi Renoth of Germany.
Whistler’s Alexa Loo was the top Canadian in 13 th . Cloutier was 31 st .
The FIS World Championships took place from Jan. 10 to 19.
