January 27, 2001

Madonna di Campiglio (Italy). Continuous snowfall accompanied the riders when the Halfpipe riders competed for the World Championships titles today at Madonna di Campiglio. Norwegian rider Kim Christiansen and Doriane Vidal from France took the gold on the "Canalone Miramonti" slope.

The mens� qualification had already taken place Friday night at floodlight while the womens� qualifyers were scheduled for this morning only. Heavy snowfall made it a real challenge for the top ten men and top six women in the finals but the pipe turned out to be in pretty good shape � it was just lacking speed a lot after all that snow got into it.

Kim Christiansen from Norway was sitting in fourth place after the qualification but took the lead after the first out of two final runs already and none of his rivals was able to catch up with him also in the second run. "Everything worked really good for me today," he said, "I had the amplitude, the transition and the vert � just what you needed to have in this pipe. It was all about the amplitude and those who went high just got the points accordingly. It�s great that I pulled it together and it feels good to be the World Champion."

Olympic silver medalist Daniel Franck also claimed the World Championships silver today. "David Ny did a really good job to fix this thing up," the Norwegian said, "but the snow conditions made riding really hard. It was super slow today but there was nothing you could do about it. A lot of people had a hard time with the speed so the amplitude was the major thing to show to the judges today. It was fun riding today even though the conditions have been pretty tough but in Italy you always have a nice audience."

Finnish rider Markus Hurme finished third place today. "I�m so happy," he said, " it was a pretty tough competition for me, especially because I have some knee problems � I hurt it before Christmas and will have a minor surgery next week so it�s great I worked it out however. I would have been good to get more training before the competition but they managed to put a good pipe in place and the shape was fine just the lack of speed was a problem because of all that snow. However, I really enjoyed riding it."

France�s Doriane Vidal claimed the title in the womens� contest. She has been in second place after the qualifications but made it up to first with an amazing run in the first final. "I�m glad I made it," she said. "I really wanted it today after I just missed it two years ago. Also it was very important to me since this was a contest with very strong riders participating. I�m glad I managed to stand the pressure � I just didn�t sleep last night so I was not sure to pull it together but I was happy with my riding today so it feels great."

Stine Brun Kjeldaas from Norway had dominated all World Cup events so far this season but missed to add the World Championships title to her scores with finshing second today. "Second is fine but I definitely wanted the gold," she said, disappointed, "having won three World Cups in a row I also wanted to win today... Doriane had such a good run and she also had the amplitude which none of the others really had. I was doing a more technical run than her with a 720 and 540, she only had one spin, but it was really important to have the amplitude and the girls were struggeling a lot with all the snow. I was actually happy about my run because I took it one step further so I can maybe do it better later." Sari Groenholm from Finland finished third.

The Halfpipe has been a big issue since the FIS 3 Tre slope was needed for the opening ceremony on Sunday and the construction of the pipe could only be started rights after at the Canale Miramonti. Within three and a half days more than 200 trucks brought a total of up to 20,000 m3 of snow. Apart from FIS Halfpipe constructor David Ny there were 70 to 80 people, six snow machines and four trucks to put all that white amount together for a semi-circular snow trough.Refraining from sleep and working on the pipe for 36 hours in a row David and the OC crew stayed optimistic and finally managed to pull it together for the mens qualification to be scheduled first on Friday night.

"It was pretty crazy to make a halfpipe within four days," David Ny said Friday night. "It took so long to rise the walls after all that snow was brought here and we could only start to shape the pipe last minute so it was pretty tough. The major problem was that the snow was so soft and if you build something in just a couple of days it�s hard to make it good quality and that�s really important to make a good halfpipe. The fresh snow helped us a little bit � it was sticky snow and kind of got packed."

This was also confirmed by Ted Martin, FIS chief race director for snowboarding: "We�ve been really really lucky. We have some of the best halfpipe shapers in the World and we had a lot of people out of this resort who have been working a lot to get where we are today. The shape of the pipe turned out very good. This was something like a miracle pipe."

Snowboard Cross will conclude the World Championships tomorrow.

SNOWBOARD WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS presented by D2 Vodafone
Madonna Campiglio ITA Jan. 27th, 2001
Half-Pipe Final Ranking Men

Final
1 CHRISTIANSEN Kim NOR 45 31.5 1000
2 FRANCK Daniel NOR 40.1 36.7 800
3 HURME Markus FIN 38 39.5 600
4 HOFFMANN Xaver GER 30.7 39.5 500
5 FERNANDEZ Iker SPA 39.4 39 450
6 MICHAELIS Jan GER 37.9 38.5 400
7 STERNER Magnus SWE 36.8 26.5 360
8 MORISSET Guillaume CAN 36.5 27.7 320
9 NORDIN Daniel SWE 0.2 36.4 290
10 CARPENTIER Brett CAN 33.2 32.3 260
Qualification
11 CZESCHIN Tommy USA 37.3 240
12 BOWER Ricky USA 36.9 220
13 KRATTER Giacomo ITA 36 200
14 JOHANSSON Tomas SWE 35.5 180
15 SORSA Heikki FIN 34.2 160
16 SIMMEN Gian SUI 33.9 150
17 BRUNNER Therry SUI 33.6 140
18 JONSSON Markus SWE 32.8 130
19 ROHRER Fabien SUI 32.5 120
20 LUNDSOR Rune NOR 30.3 110
21 LAMOUREUX Justin CAN 29.3 100
22 MURAKAMI Daisuke JPN 27.8 90
23 VASTAMAKI Jari FIN 26.8 80
24 MONGELOS Pedro SPA 19.3 70
25 MIYAWAKI Kentaro JPN 18.8 60
Qualification
26 KINGWILL Rob USA 31.2 50
27 YAMADA Katsuya JPN 30.7 45
28 VASSONEY Sebastien FRA 30.5 40
29 KARLSSON Stefan SWE 30.1 36
30 FERNANDEZ Daniel SPA 29.9 32
31 HORWITZ Zach USA 29.8 28
32 STERNER Fredrik SWE 29.7 26
33 WATANABE Shinichi JPN 29.5 24
34 ODDEN Jon NOR 29.3 22
35 STAROWICZ Piotr POL 27.7 20
36 HITZ Marcel SUI 27.6 18
37 COLLOMB-PATTON Jonathan FRA 25.9 16
38 VOHO Pasi FIN 25.8 14
39 PAJAK Wojciech POL 25.5 12
40 WARREN Eric USA 24.7 11
41 COSTANDACHE Daniel SUI 24.3 10
42 PERREAULT Charles CAN 24.2 9
43 CIAPPONI Federico ITA 23.3 8
44 FLETCHER John AUS 22.8 7
45 HOWE Glenn NZE 22.8 6
46 ARVESEN Espen NOR 22.7 5
47 BEVIN Deni NZE 22.7 4
48 SIMONAZZI Francesco ITA 22 3
49 CRAZZOLARA Werner ITA 20.5 2
50 CHASTAGNOL Guillaume FRA 20.2 1

Half-Pipe Final Ranking Women

1 VIDAL Doriane FRA 40.4 32.3 1000
2 KJELDAAS Stine NOR 35.3 38 800
3 GROENHOLM Sari FIN 37.1 32.2 600
4 REUTELER Fabienne SUI 28.9 33.9 500
5 HESSO Minna FIN 31.6 29.9 450
6 GLAZIER Lori CAN 29.3 19.2 400
Qualification
7 JONSSON Janet SWE 30.6 360
8 MASOLINI Romina ITA 28 320
9 CLARK Kelly USA 27.5 290
10 WEHR-HASLER Sabine GER 24.1 260
11 BLEILER Gretchen USA 23.3 240
12 HELLMAN Anna SWE 22.3 220
13 BYRNES Tricia USA 21.4 200
14 BUAAS Kjersti NOR 8.9 180
15 TSCHARNER Martina SUI 5.5 160
Qualification
16 HASHIMOTO Michiyo JPN 30.3 150
17 MCKENNA Lesley GBR 29.5 140
18 OTEGUI Agurtzane SPA 29 130
19 THORESEN Christel NOR 27.2 120
20 ROTH Daniela SUI 26.6 110
21 RAUTAVA Kirsi FIN 26.3 100
22 LIGOCKA Paulina POL 26.2 90
23 JARVELA Satu FIN 26.1 80
24 LEANDO Melanie GBR 24.7 70
25 OLOFSSON Anna SWE 24.5 60
26 MIYAKE Yoko JPN 24.5 50
27 BOURDIER Valerie FRA 24 45
28 YOSHIKAWA Yuri JPN 23 40
29 ROY Manon CAN 22 36
30 BRANDT Vroni GER 21.5 32
31 VALLEE Dominique CAN 21.4 28
32 LEWIENIEC Katarzyna POL 20.1 26
33 NEWTON Rachel NZE 19.8 24
34 RICKER Maelle CAN 17.6 22
35 SCHUMACHER Maria AUT 16.7 20
36 JEKOT Marta RSA 16.3 18
37 PESCOSTA Alessandra ITA 16.3 16
38 ZUREK Natasza CAN 15.4 14
39 PESKO Manuela 2.1 13.9 12
40 ZUENDEL Sabrina AUT 13.7 11
41 WIIK Lisa NOR 12.8 10
42 MLIADENOVIC Sanja CRO 12.4 9
43 COMI Rita ITA 12 8
44 YOSHIMI Sae JPN 11.1 7
45 CHRISTIANSSON Lina SWE 10.4 6
46 DUNN Kim CAN 9 5
47 SKRABAR Petra SLO 8.2 4
48 PSZOTKA Dalma HUN 4.4 3
49 ROSE Autumn USA 0.1 2
48 Laura HUN DNS