King of Style Winners

The four winners of the Peak Performance King of Style Video Qualification have now been announced. Three Americans and one Canadian have progressed to the big air competition and will join the international stars already invited to the Peak Performance King of Style event to be held during Winter Jam at the Stockholm Olympic Stadium on 22nd November. There were originally only two qualifying places, but the standard was so incredibly high, that the number was increased to four.

The four riders who have qualified for the Peak Performance King of Style event are Tom Wallisch, Ian Cosco, Michael Clarke and Gus Kenworthy...

"I'm super stoked for an opportunity go to Sweden and compete in a preseason big air as dope as this one. I'm really excited to catch some air time and just have a good sesh at a contest with a bunch of cool people. I think it's really cool that the guys over at Peak Performance held a video contest for invites. It gives some more unknown kids and such, a chance to score an invite to a dope contest." - Tom Wallisch

"I am undeniably the most excited I have ever been to go to a contest. I can't thank Peak Performance enough for putting on this contest and giving the lesser recognized guys a chance. I've never been to Sweden, and I have never done a completely scaffolded big air so it's going to be a new experience, and it's one I can't wait for. Congrats to Tom, Gus, and Clarke as well, all the Swedish girls better prepare themselves hahaha." - Ian Cosco

"I think it's pretty unreal that I managed to snag an invite within the video qualification as there were some really awesome edits. Many of which I would say were much better than what I had submitted in many regards. I was pretty lazy and just entered my Nippon Open run and somehow managed to snag one of the coveted four spots. It's an honor to be picked but I would love to see Mike Hornbeck, Nick Martini, or Matt Walker in there as well (just to name a few). The level of talent in this video qualification was unreal! Hopefully we see more of these video qualifications for events in the future." - Mike Clarke

 

"I am super stoked to be going to Stockholm, and can't wait to hit the KOS jump. I was a little shocked when I heard I was in, Cosco called me and let me know. All I know is it must have been terrible to be one of the judges, so many epic edits! The comp is going to be crazy!!!" - Gus Kenworthy

The jury - Henrik Windstedt, the 2008 freeride world champion, and Richard Permin, last year’s Peak Performance King of Style winner - faced a tough task in selecting the best entries. And that was despite increasing the number of qualifying places to four. The jury emphasized style and degree of difficulty in making its selection. The qualification of these riders for Peak Performance King of Style was announced Tuesday night at 17:00 CET on youtube.com and peakperformance.com/kos.

Jon Olsson at last year's event

“The standard of riders in this video qualifying event is so high it’s sick, and a lot of them have also worked really hard to make their entries attractive from a cinematic viewpoint. The jury’s task was to focus on the best skiing performances and in the end, we had ten names, all of whom could probably have done well in the final in Stockholm. But we thought these four were the best of all,” says Henrik Windstedt, who’s currently training hard to defend his world title.

2007 King of Style, Richard Permin

The video qualification for Peak Performance King of Style was a hit, with 55 entries from eleven countries. The clips submitted showed an incredibly high standard of riding. Almost 300,000 viewings of the entries have been registered and around 7,000 viewers have voted for their favorite entries. The jury took the 25 entries with the best ratings and the most votes and decided on the individual riders who would be invited to take part in this year ’s Peak Performance King of Style.

this year's setup

this year's setup Winter Jam is a full day, activity-packed event at the Stockholm Olympic Stadium. In addition to the Peak Performance King of Style competition, there will also be a big air LG Snowboard FIS World Cup competition, a winter sports trade fair on the inner pitch, and a rail arena open to the public will be built in the stands. There will also be an FMX show and some top class DJs. Admission is free for everyone!

The Peak Performance King of Style final will be held at 19.00 CET on 22nd November at the Stockholm Olympic Stadium and will be broadcast live on SVT24.