Halfpipe of snowboarding worlds cancelled due to venue problems

Halfpipe, a popular discipline in the snowboarding world championships held at Yabuli ski resort of northeast China, was cancelled due to venue problems on Sunday.

The cancellation decision is made out of athletes' worries after rainfalls a week ago damaged the track condition. "The U pool is not good enough. It's not flat and the radian is not standardized now. The scheduled pre-game trainings and qualifications have been postponed a couple of times, so we're worried about athletes' injury snowboarding on the pool," said swiss rider Verena Rohrer.

WCS 2016, the top event organized by TTR Pro Snowboarding and World Snowboard Federation and Yabuli ski resort, set up three disciplines of halfpipe, slopestyle and big air from March 9 to 16, drawing over 200 athletes and coaches from 23 countries and regions to the tournament.

"The rainfalls on March 3 and 4 in Yabuli resort had harmed the venue a lot. Snow conditions still can not meet the competition requirement though we tried to mend it up many times. For the sake of athletes' safety, we decided to cancel it,"said Reto Lamm, president of TTR.

"We invited expert riders from many countries this time, so we change the halfpipe competition to exhibition and American snowboarder Shaun White will enter the U pool," Lamm said. Endit