Men's semi final boardercross.

Andy Finch, the 17 year old from Fresno, California looked like a winner from the start of the day. The Team Palmer race nylons may have had something to do with it, but his riding in the first heat proved he was in Telluride to win: he smoked the field.

His good luck from the early rounds nearly faded in the final Maual Uhlmann of Switzerland got the hole shot and lead the race the entire course. It wasn't until the final table that Finch was able to squeeze past Uhlmann and beat him at the line.

Women's semi final boardercross.

"I saw him right in front of me coming into the final jump and he threw the brakes on for a second," Finch said. "I went around him and got him at the finish."

Uhlmann admitted that he made a mistake at the finish. "Coming out of the rollers I turned around and saw that I had the lead so I thought I could slow down a little for the final jump, because the run before I went too big and landed in the flats," he said. "When I slowed a little he just got around me."

Boardercross course overview.

Finch and Uhlmann were followed by Australian John Fletcher of Australia, Canadian Dave Stevenson, Vincent Borla of France and Bastien Sandoz of Switzerland.

In the junior women's competition Maria Danielsson of Sweden edged out Canadian Kim Dunn and France's Julie Pomagalski for first place. "This is the first time that I've ever raced BoarderCross," Danielsson said at the finish. "I don't really know what this means yet."

The top three were followed by Alaskan Beth Fletcher, Dominique Vallee of Canada, and Martina Maurer of Switzerland.

Andy Finch

The Junior Boardercross and the Youth Halfpipe (which I didn't get to watch) concluded the first day of the ISF Junior World Championships at Telluride, Colorado. The event continues tomorrow with Junior's Halfpipe.