After a slow start to his season, Chris Del Bosco has been gathering momentum on the ski cross with four consecutive wins - first at the World Cup at Les Contamines, first in the X Games, first at the FIS Freestyle World Championships and, as of Feb. 11, first at a World Cup event at Blue Mountain, Ontario.
Del Bosco grew up skiing in Sudbury, Ontario and had been to Blue before. From start to finish supporters, including friends and family, cheered him on.
Andreas Matt of Austria placed second, followed by Thomas Kraus of the Czech Republic.
Nik Zoricic of Toronto, another fan favourite, was knocked out of contention in the semi-finals, but made up for it with a win in the small finals to place fifth overall.
"It feels pretty good," said Del Bosco of his streak. "Hopefully I can keep it going. My first start of the day was horrible but from there on out the starts got better."
In a sport where winning the hole shot means so much, Del Bosco isn't famous for his fast starts but for his aggressive skiing and daring passes - and coming from behind to win medals.
That's how Del Bosco found himself in fourth place in the first heat of the day, putting him in a situation where he would have to pass two people just to advance to the next round. He was successful, but didn't let that happen again.
"He was fired up today," said head coach Eric Archer. "He battled through the first run, going from fourth to second, and he just nailed it in the final."
There was a scary moment for the crowd when Whistler's Stan Rey lost control over the jump and landed on his back. He was later taken to the hospital in Collingwood where he was diagnosed with a pelvic fracture.
"It was a tough day to stay focused with everything that was going on," said Archer. "The course sped up. It was probably 20 to 30 per cent faster than (qualifying) yesterday. Everything because super short and super technical."
Dave Barr was 21st.
On the women's side, Kelsey Serwa's own three-event win streak came to an end after a crash in the semi-final. She came back to win the small final and place fifth.
"I did all that I could do," she said. "I had a good opportunity to win. It's kind of frustrating but that's the way it goes... At least I won the small final."
Serwa has been picking up injuries at almost every event, and added an injured elbow to the list at Blue. However, she's going to get a few weeks to rest before the final stretch of the World Cup circuit.
Anna Woerner of Germany won the final, followed by Fanny Smith of Switzerland and Jenny Owens of Australia.
Whistler freestylers top NorAms
With members of the Canadian Freestyle moguls team dominating on the World Cup circuit, Canada qualified more athletes than we had spaces for on the world championship team. Rather than sit on the sidelines, some of the athletes that didn't make the cut returned to North America to take part in NorAm Cup competitions in Calgary and Deer Valley.
In the moguls competition at Calgary, Whistler's Chelsea Henitiuk dominated to win the event. "I had a little mistake at the top, but I pushed the speed hoping to make up for my mistake. I achieved this, so I'm pumped."
Alexandre Dufresne also picked up the bronze medal for Canada.
On the men's side, Whistler's Eddie Hicks took the gold, falling just short of a score of 25 points with a 24.97.
In dual moguls, Henitiuk placed ninth.
At Park City, both skiers would find the podium once again.
Chelsea Henitiuk won the first women's competition with Maxime Dufour-Lapointe placing second for Canada. The next day Henitiuk placed second, while Maxime Dufour-Lapointe picked up the bronze.
Eddie Hicks placed second to teammate Simon Pouliot Cavanagh on the second day, just 0.13 points back.
He was the lone Canadian on the podium on the second day, winning the competition by closes to a full point while breaking the 25-point barrier with a 25.92.
"It was a pretty tough pill to swallow coming down to ski at NorAms, no euphemism for that," said Hicks. "Fortunately, I have been doing quite well on NorAms."
At the first event at Park City, Hicks was confident that the team would sweep, but in the end Canadians only took two out of three medals. "We didn't manage to bring out the brooms, and to be honest I was extremely disappointed," he said. "It was great to win, but it would have been a lot better with my teammates on the podium with me."
Hicks said he's not looking to place at NorAms, but to improve - that's why he's been focused on points (and deductions) rather than rankings.
"I'm not focused on placing for the NorAm tour because I feel like if I'm focused just on winning then winning by a point is overachieving," he said. "That's all well and good, but I want to be one of the best skiers in the world, not just on the NorAm tour, so I'm setting the bar higher for myself and pushing myself to perform to a level above and beyond a NorAm win."
Next up for Hicks and Henitiuk is a NorAm in Quebec, after which they hope to rejoin the other members of the national team in Europe for the final World Cup event competitions of the season.
"I'm still 16th overall (on the World Cup) and feel that I am capable of improving on that," said Hicks. "A bizarre fact to add to all this is that Chelsea Henitiuk is also 16th on the World Cup grand prix, but far more strange is that fact that through four NorAm events we have had the exact same results and the exact same 309-point first place ranking."
