SNOWBOARD. The 2011 Burton New Zealand Open presented by MINI (BNZO) Slopestyle finals took place today at Cardrona Alpine Resort with Burton rider Mark McMorris (CAN) taking first place in the men’s event and Jamie Anderson (USA) winning the women’s competition. McMorris and Anderson both walked away NZ$7,000 richer for their performance on the challenging Slopestyle course.

Under sunny cloudless skies 16 men and 8 women demonstrated the dramatic progression of slopestyle riding in this new Olympic snowboarding discipline. Canadian Sebastien Toutant pulled back to back to back doubles and New Zealand’s Shelly Gotlieb attempted the first women’s double in competition.

Mark McMorris (CAN) put it all together in his second run with Fullcab Stall, Cab 270 Frontboard to fakie, Halfcab 50-50 to Backside 360, Backside 1080 Double Cork Mute, Frontside 900 Melon to a Cab 1260 Nosegrab. Close on Mark’s heels was fellow Canadian Sebastien Toutant with his Cab 540 Tailtap, Front Blunt 270 out, Tailslide 270 out, Backside 1080 Double Cork Mute, Frontside 1080 Double Cork Melon, to a Double Backside Rodeo 1080 Truckdriver. Coming in third Stale Sandbech (NOR) who’s run started with a Backside 540 Tailtap, Hardway Cab 270 to Frontboard, Frontboard 450 out, Cab 900 Stalefish, Frontside 1080 Indy to a Backside 1260 Mute.

In the women’s competition, Jamie Anderson (USA) took her fourth straight New Zealand Open slopestyle title with a Switch Backside 180 Tailtap; Front Blunt to fakie; Halfcab 5-0 to Backside 180; Switch Backside 540 Indy; Frontside 360 Lein; to a Backside 540 Mute.

Coming in second place behind Jamie was Nowray’s Kjersti Ostgaard Buaas who held it down with a Frontside 360 Nosetap, 50-50 on the double kink, 50-50 to Backside 180, Cab 540, Frontside 720 to a Frontside 360 Stalefish.

The TTR World Tour has introduced an all-new ranking system that now ranks riders according to discipline. With his win today, Mark McMorris has advanced to World No. 4 in the men’s TTR Slopestyle World Tour Rankings and Jamie Anderson has bolstered her leader position in the women’s TTR Slopestyle Tour Rankings with her victory today.

New modifications to the Snowboard Live Scoring system (SLS) were used again today by the judges, in which two judges gave scores for each individual hit, which is then combined with a flow score to provide a more transparent final score. Viewers of the live webcast on Opensnowboarding.com and Redbull.tv were able to see this system in action. The live action at the Burton New Zealand Open culminates tomorrow with the highlight event, the halfpipe.

On Saturday, August 13th it’s a wrap as Homegrown, the people behind the Jim Beam Homegrown and CoroGold festivals are proud to present the premier party on the Queenstown winter calendar. “The Burton Open Sessions” presented by Jim Beam, at the Queenstown Events Centre features a killer line-up of New Zealand musical heavyweights including Shihad, Kora, Optimus Gryme, Tiki and Sunshine Soundsytem. The Burton Open Sessions is the official after-party for the BNZO and will be cranking it out from 8pm until 1am. The good people at Homegrown, have also arranged a dedicated bus service running from both Queenstown and Wanaka. For more information go to www.opensessions.co.nz.

The 2011 BNZO marks the first stop on the prestigious Burton Global Open Series and is also a 5Star event on the TTR World Snowboard Tour. Full details and updates are available via www.opensnowboarding.com

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