The weather was a major issue in this third stage of the 1999/2000 NOKIA Snowboard FIS World Cup, held on the Kitzsteinhorn glacier in Kaprun, Austria. Strong winds gave both organizers and riders a hard time prior to and during the qualification for the season's first Snowboard Cross event today.

	First Hit

Austrian Alex Hoeller had designed the course with 14 obstacles, such as steep turns, bumps and a big jump right before the finish. What's his secret? "To build a SBX slope, you need a good slope, not too steep, wide enough and... with a lot of snow, that's the main thing," he said. "It shouldn't be too fast, the features should be wide enough so the riders can choose their own line and have different options. All in all the riders should enjoy racing and have fun."

"I don't know what to say... I've never won a World Cup, it's just great..."— Joni Vastamäki, winner

And that's what happened: 24-year old Joni Vastamäki from Finland had not raced Snowboard Cross for a long time after being injured on such a slope two years ago. He was really surprised about winning today.

"I don't know what to say... I've never won a World Cup, it's just great," he said. "My favorite disciplines are GS and Slalom, but my friends and I decided that we liked to have some fun and just did it. I was trying to stay ahead of all others to prevent crashing. This win was the result of tactic: I always went near the flat so nobody could pass me. That's something you learn if you are from Finland... you probably know who's Mikka Häkkinen." Pontus Stahlkloo from Sweden took second, just ahead of Romain Borrel and Austrian Alexander Koller.

Two friends shared the podium in the women's race: Marie Laissus, with her first-ever win and reigning World Champion Julie Pomagalski, both from France. Pomagalski said, "I'm really glad that Marie made it, almost more than being second myself, she's my best friend... The course was really nice and I prefer not to have too big features, especially at the beginning of the season. It must have been a lot of work to built it." Third place went to Alessandra Pescosta from Italy who for the first time made it to the podium in SBX.

	Crash

Right after the race, the entire course was taken down for tomorrow's Parallel Giant Slalom which is supposed to happen on the same slope. "This is always a bit sad," said course designer Hoeller. "Most of the time the whole course is destroyed immediately, but in some places they keep it for the whole winter... I'm always happy if a race finishes without injuries and then I do not think too much about the whole efforts which have been put into building the slope when they take it down again after the race."

The slope will look completely different when the Parallel Giant Slalom happens tomorrow.

—Britta Semmler, MountainZone.com Correspondent