X Games Aspen 2020 Day 4 Recap – January 26, 2020

X Games Aspen 2020 closed out Sunday with 111,500 people passing through the gates over the four day event. The final Slopestyle event of the weekend, Jeep Women’s Ski, kicked off the day before snowboarders used the rail section for the first-ever Jeep Rail Jam.

R&B/pop superstar Bazzi wrapped up entertainment on the GEICO Music Stage before Wendy’s Snowboard Knuckle Huck, Great Clips Men’s Ski SuperPipe and Snow Bike Best Trick rounded out the evening.

Kelly Sildaru continued her perfect record in Jeep Women’s Ski Slopestyle with a fourth gold medal in four starts. The 17-year-old Estonian broke a tie with Chloe Kim for most gold medals before turning 18 and also tied the record for most medals earned by a teenager, a title she now shares with Shaun White and Nyjah Huston.

“It feels great! I mean, two golds in two days? It couldn’t be better really!” Sildaru said after learning she won her fourth gold medal in four starts. “I’m just super happy, it’s always great to ski at X Games…the course is perfect and I just love it.”

In addition to landing a switch left 270 pretzel 630 and four variations of a 900 (left tail, switch left mute, switch right mute and left/right cork 720), Sildaru was the first woman to ever land a switch left 1260 in a Slopestyle contest.

Swiss rider Sarah Hoefflin and American Maggie Voisin took silver and bronze, respectively.

A mix of traditional slopestyle snowboarders and street riders came together to battle on the three rail sections at the top of the Slopestyle course. The judges looked for creativity and progression in this event that included X Games Snowboard Analyst Craig McMorris, who competed and commentated in the event, won by Jesse Paul.

Paul threw down a switch backside bluntslide 270 melon out, a frontside boardslide gap transfer to frontside boardslide and a noseslide layback to pretzel out.

“When I first got out here and was practicing, I was trying to think of the most banger things I could do and the most spins,” Paul said. “But I decided to take a step back and just do what I do and I wanted to do things that I would like to see in a contest. I wanted it to be an ode to people who are out there filming, doing street stuff.”

In the fan-favorite Wendy’s Knuckle Huck, X Games rookie Zeb Powell brought the style to the knuckle in both his rose-tinted glasses and snowboard style.

“It’s insane. I’m on top of the world,” Powell said after hearing he won the gold medal.

Jumping to the top of the rankings after his coffin slide 360 method, no other rider could match his style. He also threw a cab 270 butter 630 out into a Cab 270 butter on the knuckle to pretzel 540 out and a backside 270 nosepress to Cab 630.

Repeating his gold medal performance in the Great Clips Men’s Ski SuperPipe competition, Aspen native Alex Ferriera successfully defended the gold medal.

Overtaking fellow Aspenite Aaron Blunck in his final run, Ferriera’s runs included a right down the pipe double flatpsin 1080 japan, left double 1440 mute, back-to-back 900s and amplitude upwards of 16 feet.

Two-time defending gold medalist Rob Adelberg missed the podium in Monster Energy Snow Bike Best Trick, where Brett Turcotte took his first gold in the discipline after winning silver last year. Turcotte won with a superman backflip. In silver was X Games rookie Morgan Kaliszuk and bronze was Jackson Strong, who missed X Games Aspen 2019 due to injury.

“I am literally at the last ounce of energy. That was the longest wait of my life watching Adelberg rotate that front flip around. It’s awesome to be able to come back here year after year and chase after these medals,” Turcotte said.

X Games Aspen returns in 2021 for its 20th year at Buttermilk in Aspen Snowmass.

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