FREESTYLE SKIING: Australian slopestyle skiers Anna Segal and Russ Henshaw both finished on the podium yesterday in one of the biggest snowsports events in the United States.

Henshaw, 22, scored the best win of his career and Segal, the reigning slopestyle World Champion, finished third in the Dew Tour at Breckenridge, Colorado, which attracted the world’s best slopestyle skiers.

After qualifying for the 12-man final with the fourth highest score in the semi- final, Henshaw found another level yesterday, blitzing the field with his first run of the day, scoring 84.50.

Norwegian Andreas Hatveit, the 2008 X Games gold medallist, finished second with 80 points and Swede Henrik Harlaut took third place with 78.75 points.

Henshaw said he was “over the moon” with the win.

“This is the best win of my career, even better than finishing second in the X Games,” Henshaw said.

Although Henshaw’s first run of the day was the pace for his more highly fancied rivals to beat, the victory was far from easy.

Battling heavy snowfalls and gusty winds, Henshaw said he was forced to change three or four of his tricks just before the final started.

“I had a different and more technical run in mind but I had to make a few changes because of the atrocious conditions,” Henshaw said.

“The gusty winds meant that I couldn’t carry enough speed with all the tricks I had in mind.”

But even with the buffeting winds, Henshaw was still able to land a right side double cork 1260 in the last trick before the line, a trick which no doubt played a major part of his winning score.

With the added confidence of today’s huge win, Henshaw is focused on the X Games in the USA and Europe and doing everything he can to qualify for the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympic Games with World Cup and World Championship events later this season.

Segal, an Australian Institute of Sport athlete who qualified with the second highest score in the semi-final, joined Canadian duo Kaya Turski and Yuki Tsubota on the podium after the final, a feat she has now achieved at this event for the third consecutive year.

While Segal was pleased to finish on the podium, she said she had mixed feeling about the day because she did not ski as well as she had hoped.

“It wasn’t my best skiing today,” Segal said. “It was more like survival skiing and it was quite scary.

“I was not necessarily hoping for a higher place on the podium but I was hoping for a better performance with my skiing.

“It’s always great to get on the podium but you also want to feel like you have done your best skiing out there and put your best run together.”

Like Henshaw, Segal was forced to change her tricks on the fly, deciding at the last moment not to execute a 720 at the end of her run because of the difficult weather , which affected her overall score.

During the next few months Segal will compete in World Cup events, starting with Copper Mountain in the US on January 12 before defending her world title in Norway during March.

Olympic Winter Institute