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Rossland freeskiers on fire at Red Mountain

Rossland freeskiers owned the podium on Saturday following the North Face Canadian Open Junior Freesking Championships.


Rossland freeskiers owned the podium on Saturday following the North Face Canadian Open Junior Freesking Championships at Red Moutnain Resort.

Rossland’s Sally Steeves won her fourth title, winning the Female 15-18 category for the second year in a row, following two consecutive 13-15 age group titles.

Trailing after her first run, Steeves put together the best run of the day on her second descent on Granite Mountain to give her the gold with a combined score of 57.90, outscoring Camilla Loughlin of Vancouver with 56.43 and Thea Tuzycki from Calgary.

Simon Hillis of Rossland also nabbed gold in the Male 7-11 category with two excellent runs of 34.43 and 29.57 for a 64.00 total.  Sandy Phillips of Kamloops and and Ladd Costain placed second and third respectively.

In the Female 7-11 event, Rossland’s Erin Flood won bronze.

After posting the best time of 30.00 points in her first run Erin couldn’t duplicate it in her second go round, but still came away with a podium finish.

Mackenzie Flood came up just short of repeating her gold medal performance of last year, but would get silver with a 59.00, narrowly  beaten out by Nelson’s Haley Cooke who scored 61.56.  Hadley Michaels of Mercer Island took bronze.

Rossland skier Xander Sterpin laid down the best run of the day on his first go with a score of 34.07, but lost to Trace Cooke whose combined 67.93 narrowly beat Sterpin’s 67.54 in the Male 15-18.

In Male 12-14 Loki Wickman-Rathe of Nelson took first place, while Cooper Bathgate of Whistler came second, and Seth Amundsen of Fernie third.

Freeskiing competition uses a system where judges base their score on creativity in selecting natural terrain features and aggressive lines.

The point system is based on five categories where judges give credit based on line choice, control, fluidity, technique and aggression.