SNOWBOARD SLOPESTYLE: It was a tough day at the office, but Scotty James is staying positive about his chances in the Men’s Snowboard Slopestyle.

“I had a little slam in my first run. It’s a bit unfortunate but I’m looking forward to Saturday, keeping in a positive frame of mind,” James said.

The 19-year-old qualified 11th out of 15 competitors in heat 1 on Thursday morning, meaning he missed out on a top four position, which would have automatically given him entry into the final at Rosa Khutor Extreme Park on Saturday.  

Instead he’ll need to perform well in the semi-final the same morning.

The two-time Olympian was the first Australian in action at Sochi 2014, in the sport’s Olympic debut.

But it didn’t get off to a good start, James took a tumble towards the end of his first run, leaving him quite sore.

“I was a little bit embarrassed, I wasn’t going to tell anyone, but I hurt my man parts really bad.”

His second attempt was an improvement, but he lost valuable points after a touchdown on his final landing.

“I was going to try and go a little bit slower and obviously I landed way too high up, so I didn’t have enough time in the air.

“After my first run, I was like ‘need to slow down here so I don’t crash again’, but I slowed down too much and if I had have gone a little bit faster I probably would have landed it.”

James is keen to pull off a new move in the next round.

“I came into the competition and I wanted to do the Triple [Triple Cork]. So that’s something that I’m going to keep on trying until I land it. So I’ve got two more runs on Saturday in the semi-finals, which I’m super glad about because today didn’t really turn out the way that I’d wanted.”

Rivals Staale Sandbech (NOR), Peetu Piiroinen (FIN), Sebastien Toutant (CAN) and Jamie Nicholls (GBR) progress straight through to the final and will be joined by four more boarders from Heat 2.

The Men’s Snowboard Slopestyle semi-finals get underway at 9.30am on Saturday (4.30pm AEDT Saturday).