London Freeze

Urban snow, big air and world class tricks returned to the capital at the LG London Freeze.

Despite Sunday’s dismal weather, the whopping 35m, 100m long real-snow kicker saw plenty of action at this year’s LG London Freeze. The site in front of Battersea Power station was packed out for the three day snowsport and music festival for the second year running. More than 12,000 people turned up to see the big air competitions as well as bagging a bargain, soaking up the resort atmosphere and enjoying live sets from Orbital, Eagles of Death Metal and Friendly fires.

Battle of Britain
The Battle of Britain on Friday saw the best British skiers and riders slug it out for a place in the International Style Mix Competition. Snowboarders Gary Greenshields and 16-year-old Jamie Nicholls topped the Brits in the morning but were knocked out by the powerful Scandinavians in the evening’s finale. Finland’s Roope Tontieri went on to scoop the top prize.


Paddy Graham won the skiing Battle of Britain with 17-year-old James ‘Woodsy’ Woods coming second and joining him in the Style Mix. Both Brits put up a great show, but Woodsy was knocked out in the head-to-head and Paddy Graham’s backflip in the second round delighted the crowd but failed to win over the judges. It was Bobby Brown's whopping second run jump in the finals which triumphed, beating über-collected, headphone-wearing Canadian, Phil Casabon.

LG FIS Snowboarding World Cup
The festival cranked up a notch on Saturday with a buzzing atmosphere for the LG FIS Snowboarding World Cup. There were some serious tricks on the ‘kicker of awesomeness’, the frontside 900º (a two and half turn rotation) being a particular favourite of the athletes. There was a fair sprinkling of 1080º s, some very impressive 1260ºs and the odd double-cork rotation thrown in for good measure (in which a rider turns himself upside down twice during the aerial spin).

British Olympic hopeful Ben Kilner’s inverted backside 720º was not enough to get him through to the final, although he finished a very respectable 14th out 53 competitors. It was Finland’s Stefan Gimpl’s slick jumps and perfect landing which took him to the top of the competition, proving experience wins over youth.

Later on, it was the turn of the Americans to dominate the final challenge, the rails. Meanwhile Calvin Harris kept the music pumping from the Main Stage, followed by the much anticipated return of legendary band, Orbital, who played well into the night.


International Big Air Ski and Snow

Despite howling gales and the rain turning snow to mush overnight, the International Freeski competition went ahead on Sunday, albeit drastically delayed. The snow maintenance crew had been up since 4 am but it was well into the afternoon before the kicker was ready. High Altitude’s Ed Leigh and Christian Stevenson of Kerrang!Radio kept the waiting crowd entertained, racking up the tension as Woodsy, ‘volunteered’ by the rest of the pros, had the dubious honour of testing the jump. After landing safely to roaring approval, the Big Air Freeski kicked off in earnest.

Ed and Christian

However, although the tricks came thick and fast and usually appeared effortless, the dangerous reality of the aerial rotations became painfully obviously when Ritchie Permin had a big fall in the heats. Landing heavily on his side, he was attended to by the paramedics but had to be stretchered off the piste.

Following Permin’s exit, Ed and Christian whipped up the support of the shaken crowd and the show got back on track. Discarding the second heat head-to-head due to the late start, 32 pros were soon whittled down to eight for the finals. None of the UK hopefuls made it through, despite a valiant effort from Woodsy, Joe Tyler and Paddy Graham.

Woodsy, loving the home crowd

Scores were well into the 90s for the nail-biting finale, the athletes spurring each other onto even more impressive spins. Bobby Brown, Andreas Hatveit and Russ Henshaw battled it out for the top spots. Brown’s awesome switch 1260º earned a whopping 98 points from the judges but a huge double back from Henshaw stormed into the lead and won the top prize. On collecting his £4,000 prize he admitted that he only decided which trick to perform seconds earlier when he saw Brown’s massive jump.

The three day extravaganza of music, snow and ski drew to a close with the focus returning back to the main stage where band of the moment, Friendly Fires, wowed the crowds.

If you missed the action from this year’s Freeze, you can catch up with the highlight from Battersea on Channel 4’s Freesport on 4, which will be broadcast on Sunday 15th November.