Overall season title within Cox's reach

The second-to-last stop on the 2016/17 FIS Freestyle moguls World Cup tour is on this weekend in Tazawako, Japan, with a full weekend of competition on Saturday, February 18, and dual moguls on Sunday.

Dominating the ladies is Britt Cox who, though not totally in the clear with 605 points to second-overall Justine Dufour-Lapointe’s (CAN) 434, is in a strong position to take the first-ever moguls title for the Australian ladies’ squad.

Cox comes into Tazawako fresh off wins at the Olympic test event last weekend in Phoenix Park, Korea.

Training mate Nicole Parks is unfortunately out due to injury but NSWIS skiers Jakara Anthony, Claudia Gueili, Maddi Himbury and Kyrstle Yin.

Matt Graham and Brodie Summers are back in action with 22-year-old Graham seeking another podium after last week’s sixth place.

“I would have liked to have been a few spots higher, so next week I’ll just fix a few things up and put down some cleaner runs and hopefully the results will come through,” Graham said after the Olympic test event last weekend.

With less than a month left in the World Cup season, it’s time to look at the Freestyle Skiing overall World Cup standings, where each athlete’s points totals are divided by the number of competitions entered in the season to give an average score against which all other athletes can be compared fairly.

Looking at the 2016/17 overall rankings, it’s the moguls skiers leading the table at this stage.

With 605 points in seven events thus far, Cox’s overall score of 86.43 puts her well clear of second place ski cross athlete Marielle Thompson (CAN), giving Cox a strong chance of the biggest trophy in Freestyle.

Should she hold on to take the overall globe, which last season was won by halfpipe and slopestyle skier Devin Logan of the USA), it will be a truly remarkable accomplishment for the 22-year-old skier whose previous best rankings at season-end were 14th in moguls in 2013/14, and 57th on the overall list in 2014/15.

Single moguls competition in Tazawako gets underway on Saturday with ladies qualifications beginning at 11.45am, followed by the men’s. Finals get underway at 3.30pm.

Sunday’s dual moguls competition will see preliminary heats beginning just after 2pm and the final heats squaring off at 3.30pm.

Article courtesy Belinda Noonan | http://www.owia.org.auOWIA