Two Podiums for Caldwell in Beijing
BEIJING, China (Dec. 20, 2015) – After taking the win in Saturday’s individual competition, Ashley Caldwell (Ashburn, VA) earned herself another World Cup podium in Beijing, finishing second in the qualifying round of Sunday’s team event. The U.S. was unable to qualify for a spot in the team event finals.
With a mistake on the take off, Caldwell’s full, full, full wasn’t her best jump of the weekend. But she was able to secure the landing and take home her eighth career World Cup podium.
“When you do a take off you want to stay perpendicular, as the curve goes, to the jump,” stated Caldwell. “Instead of being perpendicular, I was pretty forward on take off, so I had to pull a lot in the second and third flip. That hurts your score because you’re supposed to stay straight. But I landed. I haven’t done a lot of full, full, fulls this year, but I’ve landed all of them which is cool.”
On the women’s side, China’s Fanyu Kong and Huilin Wuan also earned podium spots during the qualification round, finishing first and third. Belarus’ Maxim Gustik, Australia’s David Morris and Ukraine’s Oleksandr Abramenko were the top jumpers in qualifying for the men. Jonathon Lillis (Rochester, NY) was the top U.S. men’s finisher in 15th.
The aerials team event was a new addition to the World Cup tour last season. After completing a qualification jump, which counts as a World Cup result, athletes are put into teams of three based on coaches discretion. Each athlete within the team gets one jump and their individual scores are combined for a grand total.
Two teams from China, two teams from Belarus, one from Russia and one from Australia went on to the team event finals. Team China 1, consisting of Fanyu Kong, Guangpu Qi and Zhongquing Liu, took home the win with a combined score of 329.55.
“It’s cool to see a bunch of teams lay down some really awesome jumps,” said Caldwell “We all really respect each other when you do awesome tricks and land them in contest, so we were happy to cheer everyone else on.”
The FIS Freestyle aerials World Cup tour moves next to Lake Placid, NY for the Putnam Investments Freestyle Cup January 14-16.
HIGHLIGHTS
- Ashley Caldwell jumped to her second World Cup podium of the weekend with a second place finish in the qualifying round of the aerials team event.
- The U.S. was unable to qualify for a spot in the team event finals.
- In the women’s qualification round, Madison Olsen finished 15th and Kiley McKinnon 16th.
- In the men’s qualification round, Jonathon Lillis finished 15th, Alex Bowen 19th, Mac Bohonnon 20th and Eric Loughran 25th.
- Team China 1 took home the win in the team event with a combined score of 329.55, followed by teams from Belarus and Russia.
QUOTES
Ashley Caldwell
In aerials, when you do a take off you want to stay perpendicular, as the curve goes, to the jump. Instead of being perpendicular, I was pretty forward on take off, so I had to pull a lot in the second and third flip. That hurts your score because you’re supposed to stay straight. But I landed. I haven’t done a lot of full, full, fulls this year, but I’ve landed all of them all of them which is cool.
It’s cool to see a bunch of teams lay down some really awesome jumps. We all really respect each other when you do awesome tricks and land them in contest, so we were happy to cheer everyone else on.
Todd Ossian, Head Aerials Coach
The girls jumped really great in training, we just had one of those contests where the performance wasn’t there in finals. We had such a struggle with the speeds on the men’s side this whole weekend. We started to see the speeds we wanted, but the jumps just weren’t great.
All the team are really close. Everyone supports each other and we’re all friends. Even though we were disappointed to not make it in to finals today, it was fun to support the rest of the teams and coaches. It was a good event.
Men’s Qualification Results
Women’s Qualification Results
Team Finals Results
