Joe Parsons already has 17 Winter X Games medals. He just needed one more to tie Shaun White for the most in X Games winter-event history.
On Friday, at the only snowmobile event at this year’s X Games, Parson was unable to get No. 18, finishing fourth at the snowmobile freestyle final.
The gold medal went to Daniel Bodin who was able to shake off watching his fellow Swedish countryman crash in the run before him to complete an impressive run that launched Bodin into first place with a 91.66.
Despite having an injured thumb and only one week of practice prior to X Games, Bodin was able to hold off 2018 gold-medalist Brett Turcotte.
Turcotte, who is competing Saturday in snowbike cross, settled for a silver medal Friday. Justin Hoyer collected the bronze medal, his second in two years after finishing third in 2018.
Rasmus Johansson, who finished fourth in this event in 2018, endured a scary moment on his second run that left the large crowd holding their breath.
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While he was upside-down and off his sled going into a flip combo, the Swedish rider missed a grab with his right hand and went flying off his sled. Luckily, when Johansson landed, he had enough awareness and was able to narrowly avoid being crushed by his 600-pound snowmobile.
Johansson was able to walk away from the crash and went to the medical event to be evaluated.
Kenworthy ends 2019 X Games run
Canada’s Evan McEachran led the men’s ski big air qualifying Friday. The elimination included eight skiers, with the top five making it through. Joining McEachran in finals will be Birk Rudd, Alex Beauileu-Marchand, Alex Hall and Christian Nummedal.
Automatically making finals based off last year’s results are 2018 gold medalist Henrik Harlaut, silver medalist Oystein Braaten and bronze medalist James Woods.
Not making it out of qualifying were Fabian Boesch, Oscar Wester and Telluride’s Gus Kenworthy. Kenworthy had an overall rough go at X Games, finishing last in the 10-man superpipe contest Thursday and second-to-last in the 16-man slopestyle qualifier earlier Thursday.
The finals are scheduled for 8 p.m. Saturday.
Summit’s Gerard, Corning make slope finals
With last year’s gold-medal winner Marcus Kleveland out because of a knee injury, Summit County snowboarder and Olympic gold medalist Red Gerard got bumped into automatically qualifying for Saturday’s slopestyle final.
Gerard finished fourth in last year’s slopestyle at X Games Aspen and with Kleveland’s absence he joins Mark McMorris and Darcy Sharpe as the top three automatic qualifiers.
In Friday’s elimination event, Canadian Sebastien Toutant came out on top, qualifying for finals on his first run with a 92.66.
Summit County’s Chris Corning, also a former Aspen Valley Ski and Snowboard Club athlete, finished in third with a score of 89, just one point below second-place qualifier Sven Thorgren of Sweden.
Also advancing to the finals are Rene Rinnekangas, Yuki Kadono, Judd Henkes and Mikey Ciccarelli.