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Canadians rule freestyle worlds

Eight championship titles in Utah
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Canada's reputation as the first nation of freestyle skiing has never been more deserved, with the team dominating at the FIS Freestyle World Championships in Utah. All told, the team finished the week with a record eight titles out of a possible 12 - women's moguls, men's and women's ski cross, men's aerials, men's and women's halfpipe, and men's and women's dual moguls. The total medal haul included eight out of 12 medals in moguls, three medals in ski cross, three in halfpipe, one in slopestyle and one in aerials - a total of 16 podium appearances by 13 Canadian athletes. It's also worth noting 28 results in the top 10.

Peter Judge, the CEO of the Canadian Freestyle Ski Association, gave most of the credit to the athletes, but also noted how strong the program is with additional funding and support for the team through initiatives like Own the Podium.

"I think our success is rooted in both the athletes' passion for their sports and a systemic approach to sport development and high performance," he said. "Most importantly, all the athletes, regardless of their discipline, are fully committed to being the best that they can be - the best in the world in their sports -and the system is now fully there to support them."

Leading the pack was Jennifer Heil, winning both the single and dual moguls titles. Just two weeks earlier Heil announced that she would retire at the end of the 2010-2011 season.

While she's clearly still at the top of her game, Heil said the back-to-back titles won't prompt her to change her decision - if anything, she said the combined results of her teammates make it easier to leave to complete her education and follow through on personal goals, like raising $1 million for amateur sport from corporate Canada.

"The team is in such great shape, and that's not a fluke," she said. "It's pretty exciting the change we've created in sport in this country... we've invested, targeted and focused on excellence and now we are seeing the results, it shows what we are capable of as a nation."

Alexandre Bilodeau came away with two medals in men's moguls, including one world title, while teammate Mikael Kingsbury - a rookie - earned two medals.

The first event was the single moguls competition on Feb. 2.

The Canadian women took two out of three medals, with Jennifer Heil winning gold and Summerland's Kristi Richards in third. Audrey Robichaud, on the podium the first time the previous week in Calgary, also made the finals and placed 10th.

American Hannah Kearney, who has won all five World Cup single moguls competitions coming into the worlds, had to settle for second place.

On the men's side, World Cup leader Guilbaut Colas of France took the win, followed by Canadians Alexandre Bilodeau and Mikael Kingsbury in second and third. Cedric Rochon and Pierre-Alexandre Rousseau were fifth and 10th respectively.

Bilodeau was on track to win the men's title but had a small bobble off the bottom air.

"I wanted to have nice speed control for my top air and have it clean and then open the machine a little in the middle section... on my bottom air unfortunately I had a little mistake because my skis bounced together instead of crossing and that cost me."

Next up was slopestyle, which is a new event for the world championships. FIS has backed the inclusion of the sport in future Olympic Games and the International Olympic Committee was watching the competition closely before going to the members in April for a vote.

On the women's side, Canada's Kaya Turski placed second, between Anna Segal of Australia and Keri Herman of the U.S. Kim Lamarre of Canada was a solid fourth, and Jessica Warll 10th. Turski won X Games the previous week.

"I'm very happy," she said. "I landed my run and I skied how I wanted to ski. It's an honour to be part of the first ever world championships for slopestyle and I hope we put on a good show and I hope that the IOC is stoked on us and that we'll go forward to the Olympics."

On the men's side the top Canadian was Jamieson Irvine in 15th, with the top three spots going to Ales Schlopy and Sam Carlson of the U.S., with Russell Henshaw of Australia in third. It's worth noting that some of the top Canadian men in slopestyle did not take part in worlds this year, include podium regulars like T.J. Schiller and Justin Dorey, the latter of which competed for Canada in halfpipe.

Slopestyle was followed by ski cross, and by any standards it was a great day for Canada with two world championship titles.

Kelsey Serwa continued her spectacular season by adding a world championship title to her X Games title from the previous week. In second place, earning her best result this season, was Whistler's Julia Murray. Anna Holmlund of Sweden was third. Whistler's Marielle Thompson, a rookie with the national team, placed 15th.

Serwa wasn't expecting much in Utah after tumbling through the finish line at X Games, but pulled it together.

"I couldn't get out of bed two days ago and I didn't expect to win here," said Serwa. "I couldn't be happier right now."

In fact, almost the entire Canadian women's team came out of  X Games with injuries. Julia Murray came into the worlds with a wrenched knee and stitches in her chin, while Thompson injured her thumbs. Olympic champion Ashleigh McIvor tore the ligaments in her knee in a training run.

"I'm really excited," said Murray. "I've been struggling with my knee all year and I hurt it again last week. I really didn't expect to podium."

On the men's side, Chris Del Bosco was on a mission. He was within sight of a gold medal at X Games but ran out of course to finish second by a fraction of a section. He came into the world championships with a chip on his shoulder, and came away with the men's title. Jouni Pellinen of Finland and Andreas Matt of Austria were second and third.

He didn't win the hole shot in the men's final, but passed his way to a gold medal.

"I was starting to wonder about these one-day big show finals," said Del Bosco, who also crashed at the Olympics this year while trying to upgrade a guaranteed bronze medal to a silver.

"I thought, 'oh man, I'm not going to let (Andreas Matt) win another race.' He just left the door open a little bit and I took it. It's amazing."

Davey Barr was seventh for Canada, one spot ahead of teammate Nik Zoricic, while the fourth Canadian - the maximum team size for any nation - was Dave Duncan, who crashed in his first heat and injured his hand. Whistler's Stan Rey, a rookie with the team who placed fourth in X Games the previous week, was the odd man out with fewer FIS points to his credit than his teammates, but was able to forerun the course.

Canada's weakest freestyle event this year has been aerials with three senior athletes retiring at the end of last season, and Veronika Bauer injured on the women's side. That left Warren Shouldice carrying most of Canada's expectations and despite a slow start to the season he's come on strong. He won the last World Cup in Calgary the week before worlds, then followed that up with the men's world championship title.

This time, Shouldice edged Guangpu Qi of China by almost three points after receiving an unheard of perfect score on his second of two jumps in the final. Anton Kushnir of Belarus was third.

"Even in my wildest dreams I couldn't have imagined putting down a second jump like that to hear that score, 139.5, I'll remember that for the rest of my life," said Shouldice, who was sitting seventh after the first round of jumps. "We've had so many great athletes (win world championships) in the past - like Nico Fontaine and Steve Omischl - and now you can add me to that list. It's unreal. I feel honoured to do well and represent my team and my country the way I have."

Given the results by his teammates leading up to the aerials competition, Shouldice said he did feel a little pressure to do well.

"Those mogul guys, the ski cross guys set the bar really high, so luckily I was able to come through as well, and it's just been the best week of my life."

Rookie Travis Gerrits was sixth, a huge result for the young jumper, with the team's other rookies Jean-Christophe Andre and Remi Belanger placing 13th and 15th respectively.

On the women's side, Shaung Cheng and Mengtao Xu of China were first and second, followed by Olga Volkova of the Ukraine. The top Canadian was rookie Crystal Lee in 10th.

In halfpipe - another new event that is being considered for the Olympics - Canadian women took three out of the top four spots with Rosalind Groenewoud in first, Keltie Hansen in third and Sarah Burke in fourth. Jennifer Hudak of the U.S. spoiled the sweep and picked up the silver medal.

Greonewoud took the women's title by a full two-and-a-half points, but it wasn't as easy as she made it look.

"I was pretty nervous because the last time I competed here - two years ago - I fell on my 900 and got a really bad concussion," she said. "I was thinking about that injury way too much, so it feels good to get over that fear and put down a good run."

Hansen was a nice surprise for the team, while Burke - who has only been on snow for a few weeks after undergoing shoulder surgery this past summer - can console herself with the X Games gold medal she earned the previous week.

On the men's side it was Canada's Mike Riddle in first, followed by Kevin Rolland of France and Simon Dumont of the U.S. Noah Bowman and Justin Dorey were 11th and 12th, while Matt Margetts placed 14th.

Riddle's margin of victory was a little tighter at just four-tenths of a point, but the competition was every bit as strong as a pro event.

"To be the current world champ maybe when the Olympics are announced would be super exciting," he said. "I think pretty much every competitor out there wants to take ski halfpipe to the Olympics."

The final event was the dual moguls competition. Jennifer Heil picked up her second title of the week after edging out teammate Chloe Duefou-Lapointe in the final dual of the day. Hannah Kearney of the U.S. was third. Audrey Rochichaud and Kristi Richards were fifth and sixth respectively.

In the men's dual moguls it also came down to two Canadians with veteran Alexandre Bilodeau upsetting teammate Mikael Kingsbury for the gold medal. Cedric Rochon was 11th.

Despite the win, Heil refocused the spotlight on Dufour-Lapointe. "To go against Chloe, who represents the future of our sport, was amazing," she said.

As for Dufour-Lapointe, she was on cloud nine. "I can't really believe it, I am so proud of myself and so honoured to be able to ski against my hero Jenn Heil."

Bilodeau also used the attention, as he has all season, to draw attention to Kingsbury.

"It feels great to win here," said Bilodeau, who has never won on the Deer Valley course. "It's super hard to defend your title when you have young guys like (Kingsbury) coming up. I'm working harder and harder to stay there, but the young guys like Mikael are pushing harder and harder too."

Bilodeau also looked back on the week and Canada's world leading performance.

"The Canadian Freestyle (Ski) Association has all the resources there for us and it makes our job way easier."