Teenaged Hickman a bronzed Aussie

Snowboard rising star Ally Hickman has become the second Australian teenager in as many days to secure their first World Cup podium, finishing third in the season’s final big air event in Steamboat, USA, in only her eighth World Cup start.

At 16 years and one month, Hickman from Sydney, is now the second youngest Australian World Cup medallist, narrowly behind fellow New South Wales Institute of Sport (NSWIS) scholarship holder Indra Brown’s bronze yesterday in the freeski halfpipe in China at 15 years and 10 months.

Australia has enjoyed an impressive weekend in World Cup Olympic Qualification events collecting five medals: Bree Walker’s gold in monobob, Brown’s bronze in freeski halfpipe, double bronze in snowboard cross from NSWIS’s Josie Baff and Adam Lambert, and Hickman’s bronze in big air snowboard. The weekend tally could grow further with the mixed team snowboard cross event still to come tonight in Cervinia, Italy.

Hickman carried strong recent form into Steamboat, following a seventh-place finish two weeks ago in China. She qualified for the final in first place on Friday with a huge score of 93 points for a frontside 1080 with double mute and tailgrab.

In the three-run final, where the two best scores count, Hickman opened with the same jump from qualifying, scoring 88 points, and then had two attempts at a backside 720 melon grab, performing both jumps well earning 72.75 on her first attempt and improving to 74.25 on her final jump. Her two-jump combined score of 162.25 points secured the bronze medal behind winner Japan’s Miyabi Onitsuka, on 174 points, and South Korea’s Seungeun Yu in second with 173.25.

Also competing in the women’s final for Australia was 21-year-old NSWIS athlete Meila Stalker, in seventh place on 145 points in her second finals appearance of the season.

Hickman’s podium finish moves her to fourth overall in the final World Cup Big Air standings, Stalker is seventh and 2018 Olympic slopestyle bronze medallist Tess Coady (NSWIS) sits in 12th. Coady did not compete in Steamboat, opting for training in Europe.

In the men’s event, Australians Jesse Parkinson (27th), Joshua Robertson-Hahn (33rd) and Valentino Guseli (46th) – all NSWIS – missed the finals.

The focus now shifts to the slopestyle discipline and the final World Cup and Olympic qualification events, kicking off the new year in Aspen with the next competition on January 10.

Olympic Winter Institute of Australia

Photo Credit: FIS/Andrew Wevers

RESULTS

SNOWBOARD BIG AIR RESULTS

Full FIS World Cup women’s snowboard big air results here

Full FIS World Cup men’s snowboard big air results here

Follow OWIA on Facebook, Instagram and X for live updates.