Australia’s teen sensation Valentino Guseli has won a silver medal in the snowboard halfpipe event at the FIS Freestyle World Championships in Bakuriani, Georgia.
Key points:
- Valentino Guseli finished second in the snowboard halfpipe event, just 0.5 points behind first place
- Three-time world champion Scotty James finished in fifth place
- Australia has now won five medals at the FIS Freestyle World Championships, the most ever
It was Australia’s fourth silver medal of the competition and fifth overall.
The 17-year-old from Dalmeny on the New South Wales south coast was agonisingly close to a maiden world crown too, missing out on the gold medal by just half a point to 16-year-old Chaeun Lee, who becomes the youngest ever men’s snowboard world champion.
Guseli has already enjoyed a historic season in which he became the first snowboarder to stand on the World Cup podium in all three park and pipe disciplines in a single campaign: big air, halfpipe and slopestyle.
“I am pretty stoked,” Guseli told the Olympic Winter Institute of Australia.
“All of my success this year has been a process, I obviously wanted that the first year I was at World Cup riding at this level three years ago, but it’s been a process figuring everything out and happy to be finally trying to match it with the best in the world.”
After bailing out of his first run in the final, Guseli landed a solid second combination to score 83.25 points and sit fourth.
Swiss veteran and bronze medallist from last year’s Winter Olympics in Beijing Jan Scherrer led the field with an 89.25 in his first run, which looked set to stand the duration as the world’s top competitors failed to execute their runs.
However, a sensational final round saw both Lee and Guseli storm past him to take the top two positions.
Guseli pulled out all the stops in his final run, which included a cab 14 triple cork for the first time ever in competition — a trick he only perfected last week.
“The cab-triple-1440 was a trick I learnt in November, and I have been struggling a little bit with it all year,” Guseli said.
“I perfected it a week before coming here, training in Laax, Switzerland, landing five in a row and felt really comfortable with them.”
After a long deliberation from the judges, during which Guseli pleaded for them to give him the nod over his South Korean rival, the 2022 Olympic finalist was awarded a score of 93.00, just shy of Lee’s 93.50.
“If you want it enough … it’s all this, it’s all heart,” Guseli said.
“Put your heart into it and you’ll get it.”
Three-time world champion and Olympic silver medallist Scotty James was unable to execute on his final run, finishing in fifth spot having qualified second.
“I grew up watching Scotty James,” Guseli said.
“Now to almost be at a level where kids can look up to me the same is pretty amazing and I’m super honoured.”
Guseli’s silver is just the latest of five medals Australia has won at the competition — the equal sixth most of all the nations competing.
It is the most medals Australia has ever won at a Freestyle World Championships — with Tess Coady still to compete in the snowboard big air event this weekend.
Matt Graham won silver in the moguls and bronze in the dual moguls competition last week, before Danielle Scott earned silver in the women’s aerials.
On Thursday, 20-year-old World Championship debutant Josie Baff won silver in the snowboard cross event ahead of Olympic champion Lindsey Jacobellis.
There have been some near misses for Australian athletes too.
Olympic slopestyle bronze medallist Coady came agonisingly close to winning a bronze medal in the snowboard slopestyle, finishing just 0.20 points behind Miyabi Onitsuka.
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