Top Win For Young Snowboarder

A young up and coming snowboarder has taken out the Open Women¹s title in the Middle Earth Superpipe Champs at the Snow Park, beating experienced riders twice her age.

Fourteen-year-old Kendall Brown, who was runner up in the Youth World Championships in Italy earlier in the year, beat the likes of current New Zealand National Champion, Juliane Bray. Her spectacular display of solid riding not only earned her the respect of the judges but also of fellow competitors such as Americans Keir Dillon and Shaun White, the two highest ranked half pipe riders in the world.

Kendall was brought up in Mt Manganui but lives in Wanaka during the winter. She¹s been training with Cardrona Alpine Resort¹s SAS programme for the last three years under the expert eye of coach, Tom Wilmott, and was recently the recipient of a scholarship from the resort to help towards achieving her goals of representing New Zealand at the Winter Olympics.

Kendall said it was crazy seeing world-class riders such as White and Dillon pushing the levels in the same pipe she was riding and was delighted with her win.

"It was totally unexpected, I never thought I could do as well as I did,² she said. ³It was really cool with my family there supporting me too. Afterwards Ju (Juliane Bray) came up and gave me a hug, she¹s always been really supportive of my riding and was stoked for me."

Kendall¹s next competitions are the South Island Snowboarding Championships at Cardrona next weekend (27-29 August), immediately followed by the New Zealand Snowboard Nationals in Queenstown.