Vancouver, March 17, 2023 – With the famed crystal globe from singles competitions already in the bag, Mikaël Kingsbury finished strong once again on Wednesday at the World Cup Final in Almaty, Kazakhstan. Kingsbury not only won the gold medal, he did it while performing a manoeuvre for the very first time in competition.
The Canadian rocketed through the event for his fifth win of the season, and the 79th of his impressive career. In the grand final, he scored 85.67, beating Kazakh Pavel Kolmakov (78.72), and Australian Matt Graham (78.42).
It was a spectacular performance, albeit one hampered by reduced visibility due to low light conditions, but the “King of the Moguls” was able to adapt.
“We were lucky with the weather when we were training, but it didn’t turn out so well for the actual competition. I knew it was going to be a little more difficult to see, and cloudy; it was really dark, especially on the top jump landing. The snow was also falling faster too, and you had to be on the brakes all the way down,” said Kingsbury.
“I’m super happy with my win today, it wasn’t easy in these conditions. The door was open for the super final win, so I just wanted to have a clean run. I’m very happy to leave with the globe in singles; tomorrow I’ll focus on the duals,” he added.
For today’s events, the two-time World Champion took advantage of a flatter landing on the bottom jump to try a cork 720 truck driver for the first time ever in competition. The win confirms that the move was appreciated by the judges – and now Kingsbury has a brand-new asset for competitions to come: “I was anxious to see how it would turn out; it’s always fun to win with a run that has a new jump.”
Fellow Canadians Gabriel Dufresne (Joliette, Que.), Julien Viel (Lévis, Que.) and Elliot Vaillancourt (Drummondville, Que.) were all in action themselves in the first final, and ended up following each other in the final standings, finishing 12th (74.27), 13th (73.82) and 14th (73.65) respectively.
No Canadians women took the slopes today, and the winner of that competition was France’s Perrine Laffont.
The 2022-2023 season will come to an end Saturday with the presentation of the dual moguls. Mikaël Kingsbury is set try to secure yet another crystal globe, in addition to signing the 80th victory of his World Cup career. A pertinent question may well be: will he have any space left on his mantelpiece?
“As soon as I step off the podium, my focus is on the next event. I like the run, and I hope we’ll have good weather conditions. I’m going to give it my all, this will be the last race of the season so I’m going to empty the tank. I’m not skiing to win a globe tomorrow; I’m skiing to win the event. One duel at a time, I feel good and I know I can be fast here,” he concluded.
