Justine Dufour-Lapointe, Andi Naude and Mikaël Kingsbury Nominated to the Canadian Olympic Team by Freestyle Canada

Freestyle Canada – Vancouver, April 11, 2017 – Today Freestyle Canada unveiled the athletes that have been provisionally nominated to Team Canada for the 2018 Winter Games thanks to their 2016-2017 season results. Consequently, mogul skiers Justine Dufour-Lapointe, Andi Naude and Mikaël Kingsbury should all be headed to PyeongChang next February, as they have all met the “Method A” selection criteria.
 
“I am really glad to be named to the Olympic team for the PyeongChang Games! It brings back good memories from Sochi and allows me to start refocusing on my vision for the year to come,” said Justine Dufour-Lapointe. “I greatly enjoyed skiing at the test event in Korea. The course was truly enjoyable, so I’m already looking forward to the Games!”
 
Mikaël Kingsbury, who had his best season yet with a total of nine World Cup victories, and who earned his sixth consecutive Crystal Globe, was also happy to be nominated to the Olympic team. “One of my objectives of the season was to secure my place for the next Games, and now that that’s done, my team and I will spend the next months preparing for this major event,” states Mikaël Kingsbury.
 
As for Penticton, British Columbia’s Andi Naude, who will be participating in her first Olympic Games, she could not hide her excitement following the nomination. “It has always been my dream to represent Canada at an Olympic Games, and after narrowly missing the 2014 Games, this early nomination means the world to me,” said Naude. “The stress of qualification has been relieved, and for this I am incredibly grateful. I can now take a deep breath and really focus on being the best athlete I can be. It is an absolute honour to be nominated to Team Canada.”
 
Freestyle Canada’s Athlete Nomination Procedures: Method A
According to the regulations set out in the 2018 Freestyle Ski Team Internal Procedures policy, a limited number of athletes are provisionally selected to the COC in 2016–2017 based on their results at the Grand Prix for the selection of Canadian athletes for the Olympic Winter Games competitions. A maximum of three eligible athletes per discipline (maximum of two per gender) can be nominated to the COC based on these competitions.
 
The Grand Prix for the selection of Canadian athletes for the Olympic Winter Games included the following competitions for the mogul skiers:
 

• FIS World Cup, Val Saint-Côme, CAN – January 2017
• FIS World Cup, Calgary, CAN – January 2017
• FIS World Cup, Bokwang, Korea – February 2017
• FIS World Championships, Sierra Nevada, Spain – March 2017

 
According to Method A, to be provisionally nominated to the COC, eligible athletes must obtain a minimum of two podiums in their freestyle events at the selected competitions. Athletes must use at least one result obtained at the 2017 FIS World Ski Championships or at the test event during the World Cup in Korea in 2017 for their two best performances on the podium.
 
Again according to the eligibility requirements, nominated athletes must also meet a minimum performance criteria at one eligible World Cup competition of the 2017–2018 season by ranking in the top 12 and in the first two thirds of the group (excluding competitors who have abandoned).
Prior to being named to the final Canadian PyeongChang 2018 Team, all athletes are subject to their nomination being approved by the Canadian Olympic Committee’s Team Selection Committee following receipt of nominations by all National Sport Federations. Nominations are also subject to the final allocation of Olympic quota places by each sport’s international federation. Remember also that the quotas for freestyle skiing are the following: four athletes per gender per event, a maximum of 16 athletes per gender and an overall maximum team size of 30 athletes. Ski cross is included in the total number of places available.
To know more on the Olympic selection process for freestyle skiers, please click here.
 
Click here to view the video that our CBC Sports partner produced, and which highlights some of the key moments of the season experienced by the athletes nominated to the Olympic team.