Olympic bronze medallist Zoi Sadowski-Synott is itching to return to competition at the start of what shapes as the biggest season of her snowboarding career to date.
Since her stunning performance to win New Zealand's first Winter Olympics medal in 26 years at Pyeongchang in 2018, the Wanaka snowboarder hasdeveloped into one of the best in the sport.
She heads to February's Beijing Games as one of the favourites in both the big air (where she claimed bronze in Pyeongchang) and in slopestyle (13th).
Sadowski-Synott is currently ranked number two in the world in slopestyle, behind American great Jamie Anderson, and is the reigning world champion in the discipline. She is ranked fourth in big air with Japanese boarders Miyabi Onitsuka and Reira Iwabuchi and Austria's Anna Gasser ahead of her.
Last season was incredible for the 20-year-old who became the FIS Snowboard Slopestyle World Champion for a second time after claiming the title in 2019. She was a silver medallist at X Games Aspen and won bronze in the big air.
"It was quite a whirlwind," Sadowski-Synott told the Herald. "I had the most epic season of my life and I came off a really good New Zealand season and was feeling confident. I just kind of went into competitions with certain goals and managed to achieve them and I guess the results were the cherry on top."
Zoi Sadowski Synnott at the Burton US Open in Colorado in 2019. Photo / Photospot
Since returning home in late April, Sadowski-Synott had a couple of months off the snow before a slightly disrupted New Zealand winter which was punctuated by Covid lockdowns.
"In Wanaka we had a pretty slow start to it with snow and features getting built at the snow park. But it went really well until lockdown hit before things picked up which was awesome.
"And thanks to Cardrona and Snow Sports New Zealand we had everything we really needed to try to made the most of the time that we had. I feel I have had awesome prep coming into this season and am looking forward to it."
It's about to get extremely busy for the Wanaka snowboarder who has spent the last week training in the European Alps before heading this weekend to Copper Mountain in Colorado for the Dew Tour starting next week (December 16-19) where she will compete against most of her rivals for the first time since last season.
"It's a called an elite event so it's invite only and yeah, it's going to be exciting to kick off the winter season at my first slopestyle event, so I'm really looking forward to it."
Zoi Sadowski Synnott in action at the FIS Snowboard World Cup Big Air. Photo / Photosport
The discipline involves riders going down a course consisting of rails and jumps with riders scored on the difficulty of tricks, while big air involves one jump after going down a big ramp before launching into aerial tricks.
Sadowski-Synott is pleased with the week spent training in Austria and thinks she is ready to "start things off with a bang".
A quirk in the schedule this season means she is only going to have one big air competition before heading to Beijing but she has a stacked slopestyle programme. After the Dew Tour, she heads to Calgary for a Slopestyle World Cup over the New Year before two more World Cup events in the US and Switzerland ahead of the X Games in Colorado in late January, then its onto Beijing for the Olympics (February 4-20).
And while acutely aware of the issues around China hosting the Games, from its human rights record to the silencing of tennis player Peng Shuai after her sexual assault allegations against a former politician, Sadowski-Synott is keeping her focus squarely on the sporting domain.
"The way I really look at it is that I'm going to be competing in the biggest sporting event in the world. And I'm just going to show my love for snowboarding through that and sport. That's what I'm going to do."
