Winter Olympic Snowboarding: The Events

Feb 05, 2014

If you are a Snowboard-A-Holic, be sure to check out the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia. There are three events to watch and you might just want to get in on the action to see if you can by an Olympic Snowboarder one day.

Snowboard Cross

The Snowboard Cross is a cool race around a track full of hills, jumps, and tight turns. The fun thing about this race is that it is a race against the clock and against your opponents right beside you. Races are usually grouped in 4 snowboarders, and the challenges they face are to stay in control while trying to pass each other. There is usually lots of contact and big wipeouts between the competitors.

Snowboard Half Pipe

The Half Pipe is not a race against time, but an event judged on the performance of complicated and acrobatic tricks while maintaining perfect form. The Half Pipe has two big walls of snow down a track a couple of football fields long, and the snowboarder has a chance to perform two different runs on the track. Each run the boarder performs jumps as is judged by 5 judges who score the run out of 10. The main things the judges look for are amplitude, execution, difficulty and variety. So the main trick is to look cool while doing a McTwist 30 feet in the air

Snowboard Parallel Giant Slalom

The Slalom is a fast race down the mountain against the clock. The event is based on pure speed while making sharp turns around the designated flags that can’t be missed. The event can happen where the competitors race solo or two at the same time.

Slopestyle

Slopestyle is a winter sporting event where the goal is to perform the most difficult tricks while getting the highest amplitude off jumps, plus trying to preform different types of tricks instead of just one. The 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi will be the first Olympic Games to host this sport. Winter Olympic Gold medalist Shaun White announced that he will not participate in the new slopestyle event as it is a potential risk of injury for him.

The Slopestyle course in Sochi

American Gold

Snowboarding has become a very popular event at the Winter Olympics since it began at the 1998 Olympics in Nagano, Japan. At the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, the Americans dominated the sport. Shaun White won the Men’s Gold Medal in the Half Pipe and Seth Wescott won the Gold for the Snowboard Cross. The women’s side, Canadian Maelle Ricker won the Gold Medal in the Snowboard Cross.