Dale Begg-Smith has capped off his comeback to World Cup competition with a superb mogul skiing victory in Calgary, Canada.

The 24-year-old reigning Olympic champion earned 23.73 points from the judges to collect his 16th career win, comfortably defeating Canadian Vincent Marquis on 23.38 points and Russian Alexandr Smyshlyaev (23.27 points).

As is his custom, Begg-Smith set up the gold medal result by scoring the highest points of the final for his turns, but he also produced the third highest score for his jumps.

Defending World Cup champion Alexandre Bilodeau of Canada, the leading qualifier and last to ski, was unable to match the Australian, crashing out after the first jump.

“Dale qualified comfortably in fourth position,” said AIS team physio Peter Hogg, “then improved his run in the final.”

“It was a very difficult course and he competed very intelligently today for a great comeback win.”

“That’s a great confidence-builder for him.”

Begg-Smith’s AIS team-mate Ramone Cooper finished in 25th place in the qualifying round, missing a place in the final, while Sam Hall was three places further back in 28th position.

“Ramone was also going well but unfortunately made a considerable error in the middle of his run.”

“He was able to get it back together but it was costly.”

“Sam had a back seat landing after his first jump and that put him down the field.”

The result puts Begg-Smith into second place on the World Cup standings after skiing to top five results in the opening two events of the season.

The three-time World Cup champion has collected 195 points from his three outings, 50 points behind Swedish skier Jesper Bjoernland.

Cooper is also in the world’s top 20, sitting in 18th place.

A second Calgary moguls World Cup will be held Sunday, with Australia’s aerial skiers in action on Monday morning, AEST.

In other Australian winter sports news, snowboard halfpipe rider Holly Crawford has qualified in third place in the second of two US Grand Prix events in Mammoth Mountain, California, while AIS team-mate Nate Johnstone has made the men’s final, qualifying in sixth position.

Barry White
OWI