Text: Mattias Fredriksson Photos: Daniel Rönnbäck and Mattias Fredriksson

Yestersdays scheduled training had to be canceled due to heavy rain, but today it was blue skys over Åre and great conditions for the 7th edition of JOI. Training started at 6 PM and directly things went down. Russ Henshaw, who landed the first tripple cork 1440 in a competition jump ever on the first training day on Tuesday, did that again and the show went on. McRae Williams, Elias Ambühl and Klaus Finne also did tripples on the first training and tonight Elias stomped his nice tripple cork 1440s.

This yeas JOI kicker is once again built by shapmaster David Ny and it´s back at the Olympia-side of Åre, where the JOI was held all the first three years. A perfect venue for it and even if it was just qualification tonight a big crowed came out to watch. Lots more people to expect tomorrow. The town of Åre is packed right now, Easter is a huge holiday in Scandinavia and every single bed in Åre is booked out (30 000 guest beds…).

PK Hunder. p: Mattias Fredriksson

All the 20 riders did three runs each tonight. Elias Ambühl won the qualification before PK Hunder who´s back in the game after his surgery earlier this winter. PK isn´t doing the triples but proves that smooth steeze still earns lots of points with clean Switch Dub 12s and a Dub 10 Nosemute. Local Oscar Scherlin impressed us all and came in third. Dub 10 mute, Switch 12 Mute and Switch 9 Mute to Criticle in his last run.

Tomorrow it´s time for the final in Jon Olsson Invitational (16 riders in the final) and also Vattenfall Alpine Challenge, which is a parallell slalom comp right next to the big jump. A bunch of World Cup riders on the start line. As the only rider Jon Olsson himself will compete in both comps. Stay tuned here for a new update tomorrow!