Industry News
It was a successful weekend for Team USA’s women at the FIS Moguls World Cup in Bakuriani, Georgia. On Friday, December 20, Olivia Giaccio claimed her third World Cup victory in the women’s Moguls, beating 2018 Olympic Champion Perrine Laffont, who is celebrating her comeback to the Moguls World Cup after a year of mental health break. Third place on Friday went to Giaccio’s teammate Jaelin Kauf. On Saturday, December 21, Jaelin Kauf battled her way to the top of the podium, claiming her eighth career victory after defeating Rino Yanagimoto from Japan in the Big Final. Third place in the Dual Moguls went to Laffont on Saturday.
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It was the first Dual Moguls event of the 202425 season, so Kauf takes the coveted yellow leader bib in Duals while Laffont claimed the yellow leader bib for Moguls after Jakara Anthony suffered a collarbone fracture during training and is out for the season.
World Cup Moguls events are run in three runs: a qualification run and two finals. The top 16 skiers qualify for the first final, and the top six skiers from the first final advance to the second final. Since there is no “best of” system, the pressure is on the athletes to balance aggression and control in each round. France’s Laffont lead the qualification round with Canada’s Maia Schwinghammer in close second, and USA’s Tess Johnson in third. A total of six U.S. mogul skiers had qualified for the first final: Giaccio in fifth, Kauf in seventh, Kai Owens in 10th, Alli Macuga in 13th, and Kasey Hogg in 16th.
In the first final, Giaccio outshone the experienced French skier, advancing into the second final in first place, while Schwinghammer qualified in second, and Laffont in third. Also advancing to the final six were Johnson and Kauf and odds were looking good for Team USA with three U.S. mogul skiers in the second final. However, the clean slate system in moguls meant that the pressure was on for Giaccio to keep delivering, and the 24-year-old did not disappoint, backing up her first two strong runs with a smashing third, consisting of two corks, a cork7 with grab on the top and a cork7 cross on the bottom, awarding her a total of 80.19 points. Laffont finished in second with 76.53 points, and Kauf finished in third with 76.13 points. Johnson finished in fifth while Schwinghammer unfortunately struggled on the bumps and received big deductions, relegating the experienced Canadian to sixth place.
The men’s Moguls was won by France’s Benjamin Cavet ahead of Mikael Kingsbury from Canada. Third place went to Finland’s Severi Vierela, who claimed his first career World Cup podium. Finishing in the top 10 from Team USA were Asher Michel in eighth and Nick Page in ninth.
On Saturday, the Kokhta Moguls Course hosted the Dual Moguls. In the Duals, the athletes face each other off based on the ranking from the previous day, in elimination-style duels. Kauf advanced to the Big Final, defeating skier after skier to face off against Yanagimoto. Meanwhile, Laffont defeated Schwinghammer in a close Small Final, claiming third place on the podium. “I’m super excited to end up on top of the podium,” said Kauf. “I’m going to try to hold onto that [yellow bib] this year.”
Kasey Hogg was the only other U.S. woman to advance to the Quarter Finals, finishing in what was ultimately seventh place after a tough dual against Schwinghammer. Macuga finished the Duals in 13th, followed by Johnson in 15th, and Giaccio in 16th.
On the men’s side, the Dual Moguls were won by Sweden’s Walter Wallberg. The defending Olympic Champion defeated Cavet 20:15. Third place went to teammate Filip Gravenfors, who defeated Japan’s Ikuma Horishima in the Small Final. Asher Michel was the sole U.S. athlete to advance to Quarter Finals. In the round of 16, he lost to Horishima, awarding him a personal best 10th place.
Team USA returns to the States for the holidays and a training block in Utah before the athletes continue the Moguls tour on home territory in Waterville Valley, New Hampshire, on January 24-25.
