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James gold, Peel bronze on snow in China

3 minute read

The Australians enjoyed strong results in their respective World Cup events in the host country for the 2022 Winter Olympics.

Scotty James has cemented his status as the world's premier snowboarder with an eighth consecutive halfpipe win on Sunday.

The three-time world champion took out the World Cup event at the Secret Garden resort in China, host site of the 2022 Winter Olympics.

James qualified first on Friday and took that form through to the decider where his best run of 97.80 eclipsed Japan's Yuta Totsuka (95.8) and Ruka Hirano (92.6).

It has been an incredible run for the Australian since the 2018 Winter Olympics where he finished third.

James was unbeaten in a 2018/19 season that included a world championship and X-Games and US Open titles amongst his wins.

He continued where he left off in the first event this season, taking out the World Cup opener in Copper Mountain Colorado before his China heroics.

Meanwhile Australian aerial skier Laura Peel landed her first triple back somersaults in competition to help claim a bronze medal at the World Cup season opener, also in China.

The two-time Olympian scored 87.92 points in the first round of finals and 86.65 in the medal round at Shimao Lotus Mountain.

It marks the tenth World Cup podium of the 30 year-old Canberran's career.

"It's an amazing start to the season. Competing with triples at a World Cup was a big milestone of mine, and to come away with a podium makes it even sweeter," she said.

"The conditions were really good. We all took a couple of days to adjust to a much steeper landing hill than what we had been training on in Finland, but the sun was out and there was minimal wind which made conditions great for jumping."

Peel finished behind China's Mengtao Xu (105.33) and Belarus's Aliaksandra Ramanousk (93.44). Fellow Australian Abbey Willcox was 14th.

The second of the back-to-back World Cup events finishes late on Sunday (AEDT).

After China, the Australian team heads back to Switzerland for training ahead of the next World Cup in Moscow starting on January 25.

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