Norwegian snowboarder goes orbital to land historic quad flip in Swiss Alps stunner

Thomson Reuters

· Posted: Apr 15, 2025 10:44 AM EDT | Last Updated: 4 minutes ago

Norwegian snowboarder Oyvind Kirkhus made past implicit the past week astatine Switzerland's Swatch Nines by landing the world's archetypal power backside quad 1620, a gravity-defying manoeuvre that near adjacent its creator successful disbelief.

"I was successful disbelief erstwhile I was riding away. I didn't deliberation that I would really negociate to bash it, but I did it," said Kirkhus, who completed the mind-bending instrumentality against the stunning backdrop of the Schilthorn mountains.

For the uninitiated, Kirkhus helpfully translated the snowboarding jargon: "I'm going into the leap switch, my unnatural direction, and spinning backside. And past I bash 4 flips successful the aerial and past onshore regular again."

The 17th variation of the lawsuit transformed the Swiss slopes into a playground of ramps, rails and tunnels wherever elite riders pushed the boundaries of what's imaginable connected snow.

New Zealand's Luca Harrington delivered 1 of conscionable three-ever power triple cork 1980 Escos by a skier connected the purpose-built Big Air jump.

"This leap that the Swatch Nines has provided for america has been perfectly incredible," Harrington said. "We've seen aggregate world's firsts, triples, quads, truthful galore things being enactment down."

Britain's Kirsty Muir claimed the champion pistillate skier instrumentality grant with a backflip onto a rail, and credited the event's supportive ambiance for inspiring bold performances.

"Everyone is truthful supportive of each different and truthful hyped erstwhile idiosyncratic does something," Muir said. "When someone's sending, past you get the feeling that you privation to nonstop too."