The days follow one another and are similar for Arnaud Gaudet in the Snowboard World Cup. Sunday, in Krynica, Poland, the Quebecer finished 22e rank in parallel giant slalom qualifying. A day like the day before.
Despite rather difficult snow conditions, the Quebecer had a good start to the first descent, but things got complicated for him in the last gates of the course. The Montcalm athlete mismanaged a turn and lost valuable time, ultimately stopping the clock at 47.68 s.
“There is so little snow and with a second World Cup [sur la même piste] in two days, the conditions were not ideal. There were still some bumps left from yesterday’s race [samedi], especially in the last doors. Normally, I am quite good in these conditions, so I was confident,” Arnaud Gaudet confided in an interview with Sportcom.
“I just fell at the end, the bottom of the course was very difficult and you had to turn a lot more in the last gates. I completely lost the line, I had to do a big loop and I lost a lot of time,” he added.
Gaudet knew that the task was going to be difficult if he wanted to move up to the top-16 in order to qualify for the elimination races. Going all out, he finished the second descent of qualifying in 46.45 s, which gave him second place in this descent, except that his cumulative time of 1 min 34.13 s did not, however, was not enough to allow him to advance to the round of 16.
“My second run went really well. It’s a shame not to have had two good runs and it’s a bit of a yesterday’s scenario repeating itself where I made the same mistake as today [dimanche]. I was riding well, but I couldn’t make two descents that made sense,” said Gaudet.
The final was the affair of the Austrian Arvid Auner who got the better of the Italian Maurizio Bormolini.
The day before, the 23-year-old snowboarder had taken the 24e rank of qualifications. A situation that Gaudet will want to correct during the next World Cup scheduled for Winterberg, Germany, on March 9 and 10.
“I need to be more consistent and that’s what I’m going to want to do in Winterberg. My goal this season was to make a podium in the World Cup and I know that I am capable now,” concluded Gaudet.
On the women’s side on Sunday, Aurélie Moisan equaled her best result of the season in the circuit by taking 23e ranked in qualifying with his time of 1 min 46.83 s. She was 1.83 seconds behind 16e and last place giving access to the elimination races.
The Japanese Tsubaki Miki won gold in the grand final against the Austrian Daniela Ulbing.
Moisan, who had an excellent campaign on the North American circuit with five wins in eight starts, is also expected to be in the mix at Winterberg.