The well-known LAAX Superpipe up on Crap Sogn Gion Mountain was the center of attention today for the Halfpipe finals. Jiayu Lin/CHN and Iouri Podladtchikov/SUI take home the win and glory in front of an excited crowd. After challenging weather conditions with lots of snowfall, bad visibility and wind during the last days, which forced organizers to cancel the Slopestyle competitions, the LAAX OPEN week ended with a bang. Despite snowfall riders showed excellent riding and great amplitude throughout the day. 14 male and 8 female riders had two runs in todays’ finals with the best one counting, among them some of the best Halfpipe riders in the world like the Japanese and Swiss riders. Especially for the Japanese team todays’ event was key, as the four of them were battling for three available spots to join Ayumo Hirano (LAAX OPEN Halfpipe winner 2016) at the upcoming Olympics.

In the Women’s field the Chinese riders were the dominating force – like in the Semi’s two days ago. Jiayu Liu earned once more the top score and her first LAAX OPEN Halfpipe title. Her very progressive winning run started off with a Switch Backside Air, followed by a Cab 720 Melon, Frontside 540 Stale, Backside 540 Mute and finished with a Frontside 720 Stale. Fellow countrywoman Cai Xuetong ended up 2nd with Queralt Castellet from Spain (LAAX resident during the winter), who just won the Aspen Snowmass World Cup last week, rounding up the podium.

In the men’s finals Swiss Iouri Podladtchikov - Olympic Gold Medallist 2014 – won his fourth title here in LAAX today after winning the Burton European Open in 2012 & 2014 and the LAAX OPEN in 2015. Iouri secured his victory with his first run which consisted of a Frontside 900 Tailgrab, a Backside 900 Nosegrab, Frontside Double Cork 1080, Cab Double 1080 Mute and finishing off with an Alley Oop Double Backside Rodeo 900 Melon. Japanese rider Yuto Totsuka as 2nd and Yiwei Zhang/CHN as 3rd completed the podium.