Last night’s X Games Men’s Slopestyle Final was quite the event. People who stayed up to watch ESPN’s live stream (or followed our live blog) were treated to a virtuoso display of snowboarding the likes of which had never been seen before.

Max Parrot threw down the most technical slopestyle run ever seen on a snowboard – including the first ever back-to-back triple corks thrown in competition – to beat the favourite Mark McMorris and take the gold medal.

x games 2014 – Max parrot’s winning slopestyle run

The win is Parrot’s second of the week after Friday’s big air, but it was far from a forgone conclusion. In fact, right up until the very last minute it looked like McMorris or Torstein Horgmo – both of whom were dropping after the Quebecois by virtue of their higher qualifying scores – might have snatched it.

After Max had thrown down an absolute belter of an opening run (including those back to back triples) laying down the gauntlet, he sketched his second. McMorris then threw down a run very similar to his own from qualifying promptly bettering Parrot’s score, and setting up a very interesting head to head contest between the two Canadians.

x games 2014 – Mark Mcmorris’ 2nd place slopestyle run

While some people (not least the Whitelines team watching the live stream) thought the judging was slightly unfair, Max didn’t let it bother him. He just headed back up the course and threw practically the same run (with slightly more tech rail tricks) again, proving in one fell swoop that a) it was no fluke, and b) he deserved that gold medal ahead of his more famous countryman.

McMorris, looking slightly sour at being bumped down the leaderboard, headed up for his final but stacked it badly on a relatively simple up flat down bar, bouncing down the rail and landing in a heap.

Apparently McMorris broke a rib in the process, which sucks, but we’re not expecting it to hurt his chances of going to Sochi.

Whether or not he actually has back to back triples to match Max’s however is a more interesting question. But last night, it proved not to matter With the favourite down, Parrot was duly crowned the champion.

At the end of the night it was clear that there was a new big dog Canadian in town. And with only two weeks to go until the Olympic slopestyle comp in Sochi, the result was a seriously exciting upset.

x games 2014 – stale sandbech’s 3rd place slopestyle run

x games 2014 men’s slopestyle results and runs:

Click on the R next to each score to watch the run in full.