Crashes and celebration featured in equal prominence at the snowboard halfpipe world cup finals at Cardrona Alpine Resort on Saturday.
With a strong field of international riders not often seen in New Zealand, the pressure to perform was high for the finalists, and numerous crashes were the result of the high level of snowboarding.
Athletes set the bar high during their first runs, with 1080 spins and back-to-back double cork (large spins with two flips) attempts, which caused the majority of the problems for the men, but no injuries.
Ayumu Hirano, of Japan, claimed the win in the men's category, and Kelly Clark (US) won the women's event in front of a large crowd.
Hirano, who is just 15, landed a winning run consisting of technical, well-grabbed tricks high out of the halfpipe which scored 92.25 out of 100, an improvement from his first-run score of 61.77, putting him ahead of countryman Taku Hiraoka (91.75) and Christian Haller (82.50), of Switzerland.
Clark claimed a late win in the women's category with the final run of the competition, coming from behind to score 89.50, landing a frontside 1080 spin high out of the halfpipe, the same trick she crashed attempting on her previous run.
Clark said her win was a ''big'' confidence booster before the upcoming northern winter season.
''My level of riding is better than it has ever been at this time of the year so that's great for the build-up to the [Sochi Winter] Olympics.''
Finishing second behind Clark, after a noticeable increase in technicality by all of the women in the second finals run, was Cai Xuetong (China) on 85.50. Gretchen Bleiler (US) was third on 85.25.
The event followed on from the semifinals, held earlier on Saturday when the only New Zealand athlete competing was Olympic hopeful Rebecca Sinclair.
She did not progress to the finals but her 14th place was high enough to remain within the top 30 women in FIS halfpipe rankings required for Olympic qualification.
Snow Sports New Zealand head coach Tom Willmott said he was ''really happy'' with Sinclair's performance, after coming back from a previous knee injury.
''She had a great training run, and lifted her level [of riding] but did not score highly enough for finals, but it is great to see her in the top 30 for the world.''
American halfpipe star Shaun White was not present after suffering an injury while training for the slopestyle event earlier in the Winter Games.
