Zoe Gillings, Britain’s No 1 Snowsport athlete has today produced her seasons best performance finishing 6th in the latest leg of the LG FIS Snowboard World Cup Snowboard Cross tour in Bad Gastein, Austria.
Gillings started the competition yesterday with the qualification round where she displayed some excellent technical course racing to finish the day 4th overall ahead of today’s finals, and also giving her first choice of lane draw for the quarter finals.
Gillings started today as she meant to go on by winning her first heat ensuring progression into the semi-finals. She then had a good start out of the gate, settling in behind the Olympic silver medallist Lindsey Jacobellis, however, following a minor mistake on one of the mid turns, Gillings was passed into 3rd place. Despite a last second attempt to overtake and regain second place just before the finish line, Gilings missed out and finished the semi-finals in 3rd position. In the small final (to decide fifth to eighth positions) Gillings was up against World No 1, Maelle Ricker (Can), American youngster Faye Gulini, and Mellie Francon (SUI).
Gillings produced another solid start out of the gate settling in between Francon and Ricker. She made steady progress down the course finishing in second position just behind Francon resulting in an overall finish position of 6th.
Gillings commented after the race, “I’m really happy with today’s result and especially with qualifying in 4th position yesterday. I’m really happy with my starts today as I have been practising these over the summer, and I also beat the World No 1 who is one of the favourites for gold in Vancouver in February, so overall I’m really happy with the result.”
Gillings now travels to Veysonnez, Switzerland for the next round of the LG FIS Snowboard World Cup Tour to be held on the 15th January.
