Four Victorious in Mt. Sima Banked Slalom

The U.S. Para Snowboard Team is up north in Mt. Sima, Yukon, Canada for the final banked slalom World Cup of the season, and it seems the athletes plan to go out with a bang. Brenna Huckaby, Noah Elliott, Mike Minor and Peggy Martin all finished on top. 

Due to weather cancelations, this is only the second banked slalom World Cup, and third banked slalom event this season, the first back in late November in Landgraaf, Netherlands. 

Following a successful run one, the athletes head into run two, running in reverse order of their results from the first run. Brenna Huckaby, Mike Minor and Noah Elliott all had the fastest times in their classes, allowing them to run last, learning from the runs of their competitors

The course was highly technical, with a set created specifically to allow athletes to gain a lot of speed right out of the gate; if the athletes weren’t ready for the speed, they would quickly lose control. 

The course took a beating throughout the day, getting tracked out and developing large ruts and other terrain that the athletes had to navigate. 

Darian Haynes took a fall in run two, allowing Peggy Martin to move ahead and take the win in the women’s UL category. 

In the women’s LL-1/LL-2 event, Brenna Huckaby showed why she is one of the best to ever do it, setting the fastest women’s time of the day. After taking home the snowboard cross Crystal Globe last week, Huckaby is poised to earn the banked slalom and overall globes following tomorrow’s race. Dennae Russell finished fifth, followed by Courtney Godfrey in sixth. Rebecca Johnston did not start. 

Mike Minor led in the first run. With just one rider to go in run two, Minor’s time was overtaken by Maxime Montaggioni of France. With everything on the line, Minor put down one of the fastest and riskiest runs of the day to retake first; his first win and fourth podium of the season. 

Noah Elliott continued his dominant season today, holding on to the lead the entire way to finish on top of the podium in the men’s LL-1 category. Elliott finished third in the overall snowboard cross season standings last week, and currently leads the banked slalom and overall standings. He has the potential to earn both with a clean run tomorrow. 

In the men’s LL-2 class, Zach Miller led the way for the U.S. finishing third, his third podium of the season. Keith Gabel was close behind, finishing fifth, followed by Evan Strong in sixth and Joe Pleban in seventh. 

Tomorrow, the athletes will race the final FIS Para Snowboard World Cup event of the season, banked slalom finals in Mt. Sima. The banked slalom and overall season Crystal Globes will be awarded following the race. Run one is set to begin at 2:15 pm ET followed by run two at 3:15 pm ET. Watch live on Facebook.