Holy Chinook! Day Two Cut Short at Burton Canadian Open

A Chinook, a phenomenon well known to Calgarians, affected today’s events on the second day of the first annual Burton Canadian Open. On tap this morning were men’s slopestyle pre-qualifications, session one and two, narrowing a field of 100 to 40 by the day’s end. 15 riders from session one and two and the top 10 scores thereafter were to move on to Friday’s slopestyle qualification round. However, Mother Nature had other plans.

Temperatures soared to nearly 15°c, the unseasonably warm weather attributed to a Chinook, rapid winds originating off the Pacific coast that warm as they drop down the eastern side of the mountains. Although the air temperature was reminiscent of a spring day of riding, the strong winds reaching 64 km/hr proved to be a challenge for the riders and judges alike.
At the start of session one, the guys were going big and throwing down in the slopestyle course which contains rails, boxes, kickers, and a whimsical feature- a mushroom cap. Canadian Will Lavigne came out on top in session one with a run that started off with a switch backside 50/50 to backside 180 out on the flat down, followed backside 270 to board slide 270 out on the street rail, into a backside 540 on the first kicker followed by a switch backside 540, pulling a lipslide 180 on the down rail, and ending with a 360 slide on the mushroom.
The winds proved to be too much by the end of practice for session two, resulting in the day’s competition getting cut short. The action continues tomorrow with men’s session two slopestyle pre-qualifications in the morning followed by women’s halfpipe qualifications in the afternoon.

Results
Slopestyle Pre-Qualifications Men Session I
1 Will Lavigne CAN Rome
2 Eric Willett USA Smith
3 Mark McMorris CAN O`Neill
4 Matt Belzile CAN K2
5 Jed Anderson CAN Salomon
6 Logan Haubrich CAN DC
7 Josh Warnick USA Billabong
8 Zak Stone CAN K2
9 Teddy Karlinski USA K2
10 Ryan Hall CAN Clyde
11 Joseph Hills CAN ---
12 Andrew Matthews CAN Westbeach
13 Jeremy Cloutier CAN Rossignol
14 Jon Versteeg CAN Nomis
15 Dwayne Wiebe CAN Rossignol