Lake Hāwea teen stuns at Freeski Halfpipe World Cup

Luke Harrold has claimed the silver medal at the FIS Freeski Halfpipe World Cup held at Secret Garden Resort in China, on Saturday.

The event marked the Lake Hāwea 15-year-old's World Cup debut and the first top level competition of his young career.

"It’s crazy, I can’t put words to it, coming here and getting silver is a massive dream. My goal was just to land my run and leaving with a silver medal, well it’s a silver lining!"

Harrold was the first of three Kiwi skiers to drop into the three run finals, held at the Beijing 2022 Olympic Winter Games venue, and he immediately made it clear that he was here to compete for the podium.

He laced together an incredibly technical run with five different direction double cork tricks, including two rarely seen in competition switch alley oop double cork 900’s at the top of his run.

Although he touched a hand down on one of his landings, the judges were suitably impressed by the difficulty and technicality of his run, rewarding him with a 85.25 which had him sitting in third position after run one.

Harrold knew he had room to improve and tidied up his second attempt successfully, with an improved score bumping him into second place.

"I took inspiration from Miguel Porteous for my run and I have been working on it for two years."

Luke Harrold in action during qualification at the FIS Freeski Halfpipe World Cup. Photo: Buchholz / FIS Freestyle

The commentator stated at the start of the third run: "New Zealand has another Freeski Superstar in the making."

On cue Harrold dropped in and went absolutely huge on his second hit but landed a little deep, meaning he had to pull back the technicality of his third hit.

Regardless, Harrold had done what he needed to do and his second run score held throughout the remainder of the competition to secure the silver medal.

Alex Ferreira (USA), two time freeski halfpipe Olympic medallist took the win, with Hunter Hess, also of the USA, rounding out the podium in third.