Racing in the first ever team Snowboardcross World Championships event, Kevin Hill of Vernon and Chris Robanske of Squamish won a bronze medal in Sierra Nevada, Spain.
Riders were neck and neck until the end, Robanske crossing the finish line in third place behind the USA’s Nick Baumgartner and Spain’s Lucas Eguibar.
The team event, which features a team of two riders racing in a relay style competition, officially made its World Championships debut at the Sierra Nevada on Monday morning. For Robanske and Hill, the bronze medal was their first international podium of the season.
“It’s been the hardest year of my life on the tour. Things haven’t been clicking, not going well. I had bad luck, kind of a little bit of everything,” said Robanske, whose sheer determination was rewarded with a podium performance. “I told myself ‘We will be attacking (today), giving everything we have.’ So we took that, we believed in our team which is behind us, and today it worked.”
The Canadian national Snowboardcross team will now wrap up the World Cup season in Veysonnaz, SUI for a pair of World Cups from March 24-26, 2017.
This is Canada’s second snowboard medal at The FIS Snowboard World Championships 2017, as the competition continues with both Parallel Giant Slalom and Big Air events later this week.