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Posted on Thursday February 9th at 4:40 p.m.
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With the X Games done and dusted for 2012, my coach Adam Dooney, and I made the long trip to France.
I was still feeling pretty sore from X Games. However, no rest so it was straight into training at Orcieres France for the next big event - 2012 WSF Para-Snowboarding World Championships.
This was a 2 day competition format with the combination of the race days going towards the overall title of World Champion, so consistency was the name of the game.
After some very productive training on the course the day before racing I was feeling good physically and mentally to take on the best riders from around the world.
Day one of racing saw me post some very fast times. My times were also very consistent leaving me only 1 second off the number one spot after the first day of competition. Tyler Mosher from Canada was in the lead with me in 2nd and Evan Strong of USA in 3rd. Only a couple of seconds separated the top 10 riders after day 1.
Day 2 saw great snow conditions and the sun was shining. I felt pumped for racing and laid down a very fast first run to put the pressure on the other riders. My second run would have been my fastest of the 2 days but on the second to last berm I came a little unstuck and missed a gate. Feeling a little angry with myself I knew I had only 1 last run to lay it down and make the podium. Fortunately I stuck it together and my last run was fast but not fast enough to finish on the top of the podium. Evan Strong made an awesome comeback from sitting in 3rd after the first day to take the top podium spot by a fraction. Congrats Evan for becoming World Champion for 2012!
Mens podium, 1st Evan Strong USA, 2nd Carl Murphy NZ, 3rd Mike Shea USA
I was still pretty stoked to end up on the podium and maintain my number 2 world ranking. The level of riding was extraordinary. This made for the closest racing we have seen in our sport.
Once again thanks for all the support from my sponsors that made my goals for the 2011 -2012 season come true- snow.co.nz, Smith Optics, Cardrona Alpine Resort, Disabled Snow sports NZ, Base NZ, SPARC, High Performance NZ.