Shaun White’s Snow League is trying something different as it kicks off its second season in New Zealand.
The inaugural Snow League World Challenge takes over Cardrona Alpine Resort today for U.S. viewers, bringing 16 snowboarders and freeskiers together for the league’s first team competition.
Instead of competing only for individual results, athletes have been divided among Team North America, Team Europe, Team Asia-Pacific and Team Challengers. Each team includes one male and one female snowboarder along with one male and one female freeski athlete.
The competition begins at 5:30 p.m. ET on Friday, Sept. 18, which is 9:30 a.m. Saturday in New Zealand. The entire competition will stream live through The Snow League’s YouTube channel.
Four Teams, One Overall Winner
The World Challenge sits outside the regular Snow League championship season, meaning the results will not count toward individual season standings.
Instead, athletes earn points based on how they finish in their respective competitions. Those points are combined, and the team with the highest overall total wins the inaugural World Challenge title. The athletes are also competing for a share of a $20,000 prize purse.
Team North America consists of freeskiers Amy Fraser and Hunter Hess and snowboarders Brooke D’Hondt and Jake Pates.
Team Europe features Kelly Sildaru and Jon Sallinen in freeski, along with snowboarders Queralt Castellet and Jonas Hasler.
Team Asia-Pacific includes freeskiers Indra Brown and reigning Snow League champion Luke Harrold, plus snowboarders Gaon Choi and Cam Melville Ives.
The Challengers team is made up of freeskiers Mischa Thomas and Fin Melville Ives and snowboarders Sara Shimizu and Ryusei Yamada.
There is already a strategic wrinkle heading into the halfpipe competition. Team Asia-Pacific won a pre-event Teamwork Challenge at Treble Cone, where athletes produced self-shot mountain footage and voted on the best clip. The win gave Team Asia-Pacific an advantage in determining the competition bracket by selecting its opponent.
The Semifinal Brackets Are Set
The women’s freeski semifinals open with Indra Brown against Kelly Sildaru, while Amy Fraser faces Cardrona local Mischa Thomas.
In men’s freeski, reigning Snow League champion Luke Harrold faces Finland’s Jon Sallinen. Hunter Hess takes on New Zealand’s Fin Melville Ives in the other semifinal.
Olympic gold medalist Gaon Choi faces veteran Spanish snowboarder Queralt Castellet in the women’s snowboard bracket, while Brooke D’Hondt goes against Sara Shimizu.
The men’s snowboard competition features Cam Melville Ives against Jonas Hasler, followed by Jake Pates against Ryusei Yamada.
The head-to-head competition uses a best-of-three format. Athletes have to drop into both the left and right walls during their first two runs, and the first athlete to win two runs advances.
Snow League Is Experimenting With the Rules
The team concept is not the only experiment happening at Cardrona.
The semifinals will include a 720-degree rotation cap designed to place more emphasis on amplitude, grabs, creativity, execution and style rather than increasingly large rotations.
The restriction disappears in the finals, where athletes can attempt their full range of tricks.
The World Challenge is also introducing one-hit tiebreakers. If a head-to-head matchup requires a third run, competitors will settle it with a single hit instead of another complete halfpipe run. The concept grew out of a spontaneous one-hit battle between Yuto Totsuka and Ryusei Yamada during the league’s first season in China.
That makes the Cardrona event something of a testing ground for The Snow League. The competition does not affect regular-season standings, giving the league room to experiment with team scoring, altered trick restrictions and different head-to-head formats before the regular championship season begins.
A Bigger Second Season for The Snow League
White launched The Snow League as a professional halfpipe circuit combining snowboarding and freeskiing. Its inaugural season featured four events and a $2.2 million total prize purse, with Sena Tomita and Yuto Totsuka winning the snowboard titles and Eileen Gu and Luke Harrold becoming the first freeski champions.
The league is also expanding its reach this season. The Snow League’s expanded NBC Sports partnership, which includes more than 50 hours of live Peacock coverage during Season Two and live streams of every competition on The Snow League’s YouTube channel.
After the World Challenge, the regular Snow League season begins at Buttermilk at Aspen Snowmass from Jan. 7 through 9, 2027. Park City Mountain follows from Jan. 21 through 23 before the championship finale at LAAX, Switzerland, in March.
For now, Cardrona is serving as the laboratory.
The four-team World Challenge begins at 5:30 p.m. ET Friday, with freeski semifinals followed by snowboard semifinals, finals and the crowning of the first Snow League team champion. Pumped up for the kickoff, hope you can tune in!
