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X Games Aspen 2016 – Matt Ladley Wins Men’s Snowboard Halfpipe

Event cut short due to heavy snow

At any contest, it’s always good to get your first run down. In Matt Ladley‘s case, however, it meant earning X Games gold on a stormy night in Aspen.

Matt was one of the few to get a clean run put down, launching a 20-foot backside 900 on his first hit and following it up with frontside 1260, method, frontside 1080, cab double cork 1080 and frontside double cork 1080. A near-fall at the end could have proved costly – very costly, as it happened – but his heel edge held and he walked away with a score of 82.33.

Ben Ferguson wasn’t far behind, stomping a run that included double crippler, cab and frontside double corks and his trademark gator roll right at the death. It was enough to overtake Scotty James, who only took five hits but made them all count.

As for the favourites, it was a bit of a horrorshow. Ayumu Hirano and Iouri Podlatchikov‘s runs come unstuck on fairly standard tricks, while defending champ Danny Davis was struggling with an ankle injury picked up in practice. In normal circumstances the experienced trio would likely dig deep in runs two and three, but the continuing blizzard meant that the course was running painfully slow. By the time Scotty was starting his second run, he couldn’t even make it to the drop-in point of the wall.

Where’s Scotty?

The even was swiftly held, then abandoned. Frank Wells and his team at Snow Park Technologies have been known to pull off miracles in the past, and certainly did what they could, but this year Mother Nature reminded everyone who’s in charge.

It’s great news for Matt, who’s been on the circuit for years but has recently stepped it up a gear, impressing the hell out of us at Peace Park 2015. Same goes for Ben, who many thought would likely get a medal this time around. Scotty, meanwhile, became the first Australian man to win a snowboarding medal at X Games halfpipe; he’s got some way to go before catching up with Torah Bright, but we reckon we’ll see him up there again before long.

 

1st – Matt Ladley 82.33
2nd – Ben Ferguson 79.00
3rd – Scotty James 76.00
4th – Brett Esser 66.66
5th – Gabe Ferguson 60.33
6th – Jan Scherrer 57.33
7th – Taku Hiraoka 57.00
8th – Christian Haller 50.00
9th – Danny Davis 40.33
10th – Ayumu Hirano 40.33
11th – Chase Josey 38.33
12th – Iouri Podladtchikov 11.33

 

Check out the rest of the schedule for X Games 2016 here

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