Winter Olympics 2022 - USA’s Chloe Kim reaches snowboard halfpipe final as she looks to defend her PyeongChang title

Chloe Kim advances to the snowboard halfpipe final after a successful qualifying run at Zhangjiakou Genting Snow Park. Kim — the defending halfpipe champion — came out of the blocks and delivered a safe but smooth opening run, returning a table topping 87.75 score as she put one foot in Thursday’s final.

Ad/> The riders’ take two attempts at the halfpipe and will use their best score from the two in an attempt to progress to the final, and questions were asked whether the goofy-stanced rider would go for a better score on her second attempt or save her big tricks for her gold medal run as her qualification status was all but safe. /> Beijing 2022Watch dramatic moment Karl clinches emotional snowboard gold18 HOURS AGO The 21-year-old chose to utlilise her free hit to set up her finals run, but fell as she only managed to score 8.75.

Japan’s Mitsuki Ono, 17, impressed on her second run as she earned 83.75 to move second in the leaderboard and reach the final. Jiayu Liu of China and Spain’s Queralt Castellet qualified with scores of 83.25 and 78.75 respectively, as well as Japan duo Sena and Ruki Tomita.

/> Switzerland’s Berenice Wicki and Canada’s Brooke Dhondt both qualified, and sandwiched in between the pair was Dhondt’s compatriot Elizebeth Hosking who qualified with two runs to go. Riders in the 65-66 score bracket endured a painful wait to see if their scores were enough to qualify.

USA’s Maddie Mastro dipped in and out of 12th place with her best score of 65.75, whilst China’s Leng Qiu only slightly bettered the American’s score with 66.25 to qualify, whilst Mastro ultimately lost out. Medal table Schedule and results Team GB German rider Leilani Ettel made up the remainder of the qualification places in 11th place