{"id":21128,"date":"2020-01-26T11:54:39","date_gmt":"2020-01-26T18:54:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.skyhinews.com\/?p=62723"},"modified":"2020-01-27T09:29:32","modified_gmt":"2020-01-27T16:29:32","slug":"blunck-irving-look-to-challenge-ferreira-wise-in-x-games-mens-ski-superpipe-final-sunday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/local-news\/blunck-irving-look-to-challenge-ferreira-wise-in-x-games-mens-ski-superpipe-final-sunday\/","title":{"rendered":"Blunck, Irving look to challenge Ferreira, Wise in X Games men\u2019s ski superpipe final Sunday"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
X Games skier Birk Irving stands at the base of superpose after Friday’s eliminations.<\/strong>
Kelsey Brunner, Aspen Times<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

ASPEN \u2013 Birk Irving outdueled Aaron Blunck to win Friday\u2019s qualifier. Now both will have to outduel Alex Ferreira, David Wise and Nico Porteous in Sunday\u2019s men\u2019s ski superpipe final to wrap up X Games Aspen.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s definitely a little stressful having to do a qualifier, but honestly, once you get through that qualifier the stress is done, you are in finals,\u201d Blunck said Friday. \u201cThe stress is off now I\u2019ve made it. Now it\u2019s time to go enjoy the weekend and have some fun.\u201d<\/p>\n

Blunck, 23 of Crested Butte, only has one X Games medal in his career that goes back to 2013 when he took seventh in the Buttermilk superpipe. Although, his lone medal was gold in 2017, arguably the biggest win of his career. He\u2019s also the two-time reigning world champion.<\/p>\n

Along with the rest of the eight-man field, Blunck will have to deal with the new format that is being used across most ski and snowboard events at X Games this year. Sunday\u2019s 7 p.m. final will be a 30-minute jam session judged on overall impression opposed to a single run.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe jam format is totally my kind of thing. I\u2019m really into it. I think it makes you need to be versatile and show you can drop in on one wall and go switch and go forward off the other and change it up,\u201d Blunck said. \u201cWe get so caught up with that one-run format, so everyone works for that one run. It\u2019s really cool to be able to go into it all and do everything and change who you are as a skier and show who you are at the same time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Winter Park\u2019s Irving, 20, has a couple of X Games appearances under his belt, finishing a career-best fourth in 2017. He is in the midst, however, of one of his best seasons, winning the season-opening World Cup in New Zealand back in September. He was fourth at the Copper Grand Prix and fourth again at a World Cup in China last month.<\/p>\n

Irving also won the Mammoth Grand Prix to close the 2018-19 competition season.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s coming in with an open mind in regards to this year\u2019s X Games format.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s new and I really like it. It just promotes variety and shows how good everyone is good at skiing,\u201d Irving said Friday. \u201cRather than trying to focus on doing one run the whole time, everyone is out there trying to put different runs down and showcasing the tricks they have. I think it\u2019s really cool and I like it a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n

Irving and Blunck have a lot to overcome to get on the podium Sunday. New Zealand\u2019s Porteous, only 18, is last year\u2019s X Games bronze medalist and also has a bronze from the 2018 Winter Olympics. Nevada\u2019s Wise, 29, has the best resume of everyone, one that includes four X Games gold medals and two Olympics golds.<\/p>\n

Then, of course, there is Aspen\u2019s Ferreira, the reigning X Games Aspen gold medalist and reigning Olympic silver medalist.<\/p>\n

\u201cTraining has been going great,\u201d Ferreira said Thursday. \u201cWe had an awesome training Monday and Tuesday night and I feel like I\u2019m skiing well and I\u2019m happy. When you are skiing well and you are happy, then usually good results come.\u201d<\/p>\n

Also competing in Sunday\u2019s ski superpipe final are Canadians Noah Bowman, who won silver back in 2012, and Brendan MacKay, as well as Boulder\u2019s Lyman Currier, a 2014 Olympian. Aspen\u2019s Cassidy Jarrell, 20, made his X Games debut Friday in the elimination, finishing sixth with only the top five advancing to finals.<\/p>\n

Led by Ferreira, Wise and Blunck, all three men with X Games gold medals, Sunday\u2019s show is set to be wild.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt definitely helped me get into it a little bit more in the competition mindset and be able to go into finals just knowing what I need to do and what I can do better, so I\u2019m really stoked about it,\u201d Blunck said of the qualifier. \u201cThe pipe is really good this year. It\u2019s actually probably the best it\u2019s been in the last couple of years. It\u2019s been really fun. The vibes are really high. Everyone\u2019s been killing it, so it\u2019s been a good time overall.\u201d<\/p>\n

via:: Sky-Hi News<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

X Games skier Birk Irving stands at the base of superpose after Friday’s eliminations.Kelsey Brunner, Aspen Times ASPEN \u2013 Birk Irving outdueled Aaron Blunck to win Friday\u2019s qualifier. Now both will have to outduel Alex Ferreira, David Wise and Nico Porteous in Sunday\u2019s men\u2019s ski superpipe final to wrap up X Games Aspen. \u201cIt\u2019s definitely […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-21128","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-17 18:21:44","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KRKY Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21128","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21128"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21128\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21140,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21128\/revisions\/21140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21128"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21128"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21128"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}