African Powder

Afriski, Lesotho – Come the end of July South Africa's best snowboarders will be making their way to Afriski Mountain Resort for the 10th edition of Quiksnow SA National Snowboard Champs. The 10th anniversary of this popular event promises to the best one yet with top riders seeking gold, great new additions to 'Kapoko Park' and an awesome evening entertainment program set to rock the mountain resort.

When one thinks of Africa one hardly think of snow but this is not the case with Afriski, the mountain resort set at 3100m in the Lesotho Maluti mountains. Inspite of a winter that has been reluctant to fully emerge so far, the resort has made record amounts of snow to compensate for a snowless winter to date. This is in sharp contrast to last year when close to 2m of natural snow fell during the course of winter.  

Over 60 competitors will be competing in 4 categories at Afriski’s Kapoko Snow Park at this years event. Categories include mens slopestyle, ladies slopestyle, junior slopestyle and freestyle skiing. Slopestyle is the youngest and most popular of the snowboarding disciplines and has evolved into a competitive event for freestyle snowboarders that involves an athlete performing tricks in the air as well as on rails and boxes. Unlike racing, there is no clock, competitors are awarded points for style and difficulty of their run by a group of judges. This snowboard discipline will make its first Olympic debute at the Sochi winter games in Russia early in 2014.

Top riders that will be in attendance are juniors Luke Dutton and Dean van Gruenen. Luke, from Durban, has spent the better part of the year training in Europe while Dean has chosen to train at his home base in Johannesburg on an artificial slope. Multi title winner and stalwart Marcin Jekot will back to defend his title against the upcoming new generation of SA snowboarders.   

Friday 2nd of August sees the qualifiers kicking of the event with finals on Saturday. The awards ceremony will take place directly after the event on Saturday afternoon. Awards include gold, silver and bronze medals to go with some great Quiksilver product prizes. A new edition for 2013 is the Nixon WTA (Winner Take All) watch, the watch is valued at R11 000 and will be awarded to the rider that blows minds with his/her riding, does something out of the ordinary and doesn't necessary have to make the podium.    

Quiksnow SA National Snowboard Champs is proudly sponsored by Quiksilver and is hosted by Afriski in association with SnowSports SA, the winter sports federation responsible for competitive snowboarding in SA.