Beida Lake, China – Canada’s Olivier Rochon battled freezing temperatures and high winds en route to a bronze medal in the FIS Freestyle aerial event in China on Saturday.

The weather caused some serious consternation amongst athletes and coaches who were worried about safety. Eventually, organizers altered the regular format to a one-jump event, which meant that each athlete had only one chance and about three-and-a-half seconds in the air to make the podium.

Guangpu Qi of China used his airtime well and placed first with a considerable score of 131.67; his countryman Zongyang Zia took the silver at 127.66 and Rochon was third with a score of 123.45.

Rochon explained that most of the aerialists had planned to downgrade their jumps, but not him. “Because of the wind I only got a couple of training jumps in, but I was confident about them so I decided to go for my hardest trick, [a quadruple twisting, triple backflip]. When the Chinese guys who jumped after me saw that I landed well, they decided to do harder tricks too … I don’t mind, I’m happy for them, but I am glad that I blocked a Chinese sweep.”

Rochon said he is confident in challenging weather conditions because he has good skiing skills, which help him land consistently. “And,” he added, “My first coach, [Nicolas Fontaine], “made us jump in every kind of weather, so I’m ready for anything.”

The bronze medal means Rochon, who has been on the podium four times already this season, keeps a grip on the yellow leader’s bib by a margin of 50 points over Jia. When asked if he’s feeling pressure to keep amassing results, Rochon replied, “I try not too look at the big picture, when I do that I get ahead of myself and I learned the hard way that when I get ahead of myself I go down. So, I’m working really hard to stay in the moment and look at everything jump by jump.”

Scotty Bahrke, of Squaw Valley, Calif., finished ninth by throwing a full full full for the best result for U.S. men after downgrading his trick due to the windy conditions.

“Today was a little rough. We had a screaming headwind all day. It was freaking a lot of people out,” Bahrke explained. “We didn’t get as many training jumps as I would’ve liked. I hit my speed, but was still a little slow so I had to pull my feet in a little and landed. Everyone after they jumped and landed had a smile on their face. We were just glad to be done and safe.”

Dylan Ferguson, of Amesbury, Mass., the only other American to enter, ended 13th after landing his back-full full full on the knuckle. His result was just ahead of Montreal’s Jean-Christophe André, the only other Canadian who entered Saturday’s competition.

On the women’s side, China swept the podium with Xin Zhang in top spot at 101.16; Mengtao Xu second at 95.70 and Shuang Cheng third with a score of 89.30.

There were no American or Canadian women represented at the event on Saturday. In fact, the field was comprised of only 15 men and eight women.

The next aerials World Cup will be held in Kreischberg Austria on Friday.

OFFICIAL RESULTS
FIS Freestyle World Cup
Beida Lake, China – Feb. 11, 2012
Aerials

Men:

Women: