*UPDATE*: OK so apparently we can’t stream this in the UK ‘due to rights restrictions.’ Well that sucks balls. Apologies folks, look out for a full report in the near future…
The Air and Style is pretty much as big as it gets in the snowboard big air contest world. The first ever Air and Style, launched back in 1994, was won by Swiss rider Reto Lamm (who also now happens to be the president of the World Snowboard Tour) and pitted other legendary riders like Shawn Palmer, Bryan Iguchi and Terje Haakonsen against each other. Fast forward 20 years and the Air and Style is one of only 8 six star events on the World Snowboard Tour, invites some of the best riders to compete head to head and has a prize purse that has increased seven-fold from $10,000 to a bank account busting €75,000.
The new Beijing edition of the Air and Style precedes the traditional European version of the event held in Innsbruck/Munich and is all set to kick off tomorrow at the Olympic Birdnest stadium. You’ll be able to stream the broadcast on the Air and Style website here and it all starts at 12.30pm CET tomorrow – 11.30am to us here in the UK.
The rider list is looking very tidy indeed with the likes of Ulrik Badertscher (last year’s winner), Mark McMorris, Sebastien Toots and Chas Guldemond all preparing to battle it out. Interestingly and rather disappointingly there are no Brits on the list. Surely Billy Morgan should have received an invite after schooling many of these riders at this years London Freeze Festival? The head to head pairings have just been drawn and are as follows:
We’ll be following all of the action and adding run by run updates to this post as they happen. If last year’s event in Beijing is anything to go by pretty we’re sure that it’s going to go be quite a spectacle. We’d love for you to get involved as well so if you’d like to add any thoughts as you watch the broadcast, feel free to leave a comment below or email [email protected] and we’ll incorporate the best ones into our live posts.
LIVE WEB BLOG
Tune in tomorrow to see our run by run commentary from the event.
