By Liam Morgan

Oakley has featured in 36 World Cup events but claimed her first win in front of her home crowd ©Getty ImagesAmerican KC Oakley earned her first-ever International Ski Federation (FIS) Freestyle moguls World Cup event victory in front of her home crowd at Deer Valley.

With a bumper attendance cheering her on, Oakley laid down three exceptional runs as she finished with a score of 82.53, which proved too strong for Canadian sisters Justine and Chloe Dufour-Lapointe.

In the men's competition, Mikael Kingsbury claimed his second straight win ahead of Matt Graham and Patrick Deneen.

The day started badly for the US women's team as Hannah Kearney - the World Cup leader before this event - failed to make it out of the qualification round owing to an uncharacteristic mistake at the top of her first run.

Thankfully for the partisan American crowd, they did eventually have something to celebrate, although Justine Dufour-Lapointe did edge Oakley in the opening round.

But 26-year-old veteran of 36 World Cup starts Oakley roared back in the super final to claim a superb victory.

"It's crazy," she said.

"I don't even know how I feel.

"I don't want to say I wasn't expecting it, but I wasn't expecting it.

"There was no strategy that went into it.

"Slowly I've been coming back from injury, I've been getting more confident, but I just skied my run and brought exactly what I wanted to into my run today."

The men's event started with a terrible crash in which Japanese athlete and World Cup leader Sho Endo had to be carried off on a stretcher, although he was responsive and mobile when he departed the course.

Kingsbury earned another victory at Deer Valley to extend his lead at the top of the moguls leaderboard ©Getty ImagesKingsbury earned another victory at Deer Valley to extend his lead at the top of the moguls leaderboard ©Getty Images



American Deneen meanwhile had put down a blistering run that would take some matching, but Kingsbury responded brilliantly, claiming a score of 90.25 which was over five points ahead of nearest challenger Graham, who earned the first podium finish of his career to date.

"My plan today was just to ski consistent and put up my best run when it matters the most, and I was able to do that, so I'm very excited," Kingsbury said.

"Matt (Graham) and Patrick (Deneen) had very high scores, so I knew I had to make no mistakes, and I did exactly what I wanted to do.

"Two clean jumps, a fast time, and no mistakes."

The competition continues with the dual moguls tomorrow before the aerials event begins on January 14 in Kreischberg, Austria.

Contact the writer of this story at [email protected]


Related stories
January 2015: 
United States dominate on home snow at Freestyle Skiing World Cup
January 2015: Kingsbury stretches winning streak at moguls World Cup event in Calgary
October 2014: FIS Freestyle and Snowboard World Championships to be broadcast on YouTube